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l^attarH Collese fLibrars 

FKOM THE BSqUEST OF 

SAMUEL SHAPLEIGH> 

(OlMS Of IVSfl), 



LATE LIBRARIAN OP HARVARD COLLEGE. 






'''•''* "''^M^> 



o . THE /^^^r-;;,./J 

lALLANTYNE-HUMBUG HANDLED, 

A LETTER 

aro - 

SIR ADAM FEKGUSSON. 



BY THE AUTHOR OP 



MEMOIRS OF THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. 



ROBERT CADELL, EDINBURGH; 
JOHN MURRAY, AND WHITTAKER & CO. LONDON. 

MDCCCXXXIX. 



I". 



'£1 



/;vcr;>./^ 



vJUN 15 1909 
mmM. AUG 1^1911 (/ 

STETKKSON & CO. PBWTBBS, 
THISTLI STKUT. 




^ » . ' ■ ^^-^-^Tiii WilH' Iji I '< H ' ^ — ' ^r^ 



TO 

SIR ADAM FERGUSSON, 

&C. &C. &C. 
HUNTLY BURN, MELROSE. 



Regent's Park, 

March 12, 1839. 

Dear Sir Knight, 

In August last, I saw the Edinburgh book-shops 
fuid newspapers placarded, in a most lavish manner, with 
advertisements of a pamphlet aititled " Refutation of the 
Misstatements and Calumnies contained in Mr Lockhart's 
Life of Sir Walter Scott, Bart, respecting the Messrs 
Ballantyne." J was informed, that in the Radical and 
nether Whig circles of your Capital, this tract had pro- 
duced what the Reporters call a " vivid sensation," and 
that the said saisation was if possible stiU more intense at 
Kelso. But I found the few of my old acquaintance I then 
encountered laughing heartily at the whole affair. They 
all seemed to take for granted that I had perused the 
performance with the calmness of perfect contempt; and 
to agree with me that I ought to answer it no other- 
wise^ if at all, than by quietly affixing a few docu- 
mentary notes or appendices to the first reprint of the 
book it assailed. 



2 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FER6USSON. 

Some weeks ago, my publisher called on me to prepare 
a new edition, and I set about the necessary revision of my 
materials and authorities. But I presently perceived that, 
in regard to this Ballantyne controversy, I could not 
follow out the method originally proposed, without very 
awkwardly burthening the pages of my narrative, and, 
what would have been worse, without giving the whole 
work a controversial aspect. I have now, therefore, re- 
solved on throwing what I think it worth while to say on 
this matter into a separate form, and I hope you will par- 
don my adopting that of a Letter to yourself. You knew 
and loved Sir Walter from your boyish days ; you have 
been long my friend; you knew the Ballantynes about 
as well as I did during their lifetime; you are esteemed 
a good analyser of evidence ; and, notwithstanding all 
the sobering influences of years, you are still, I suppose, 
not unlikely to be diverted with the complete exposure 
of consummate impudence. 

I shall have occasion to employ plain language in 
reference to the manufacturers of this pamphlet ; but I 
beg you to understand once for all, that I consider their 
putting the son of James Ballantyne in the front of 
their battle as a mere piece of fudge. That youth has 
just, as I hear, concluded his London apprenticeship as 
a printer. He had no doubt been taught to regard the 
Patriarchs of his house as great men, and might naturally 
enough view it as a portentous thing that anybody should 
venture to depict them — the one as a frisky tricksy little 
scapegrace — the other as at best a well-meanipg bore, 
who owed whatever of good fortune he ever possessed 
to the patronage of Sir Walter Scott, and was, however 
undesignedly, a main cause of Sir Walter's pecuniary 
difficulties and disasters, by reason of his indolence and 
negligence as the manager of their joint concerns. He 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUS80N. 3 

is made to talk of me as never having known the yoimger 
of the brothers " at all," (p. 19.) He himself was about 
three or four years of age when I saw his uncle laid in 
the grave. He was a lad of fifteai or sixteen when he 
he had the misfortune to lose his father. I do not wonder 
that he should have lent willing ears to the real authors 
of this pamphlet, when they told him that my representa- 
tions of both father and uncle were " gross caricatures." 
Nay, I am ctodid enough to go farther. I think it pos* 
sible that such of these real authors as were in the em- 
ployment of the elder Ballantyne, may have regarded 
him from a point of view not over favourable to cor- 
rectness of vision. Such persons were themselves, per- 
haps, of importance in circles of their own, as having 
been connected, however subordinately, with the grave 
Baskerville of the Canongate. I can make allowance 
for their feeling some little surprise when the giant on 
whose shoulders themselves had been perched, was seen 
shrinking to a very ordinary stature. But neither were 
these the chief artificers of this imposture. It was mgdnly 
and substantially the work of Trmtees^ who knew better. 
These did know the men they were writing about, as 
well — I must add — as the true history of their transac- 
tions. They know very well, that what are called carica- 
tures, may nevertheless be more true and lifelike repre- 
sentations, than those which flattering limners are hired to 
execute for the gratification of personal or family vanity. 
They know, that in the case of these Ballantynes, the 
follies and absurdities which met every unfilmed eye in 
their personal manners and habits, were too ^^ gross" to 
be susceptible of caricature. They know that you might 
as well talk of caricaturing Mathews in Jeremy Diddler, 
or Liston in Malvolio. They know that Bunbury, Gilray, 
and H» B. rolled into one, could never hav« c^icatured 
either the pompous printer or the frivolous auctioneer, of 



4 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGtJSSON. 

whom the one groaned, and the other chirped, when they 
gathered from Charles Mathews's exquisite mimicry, that 
their " illustrious friend" had christened them respec- 
tively his Aldiborontiphosoophornio, and his Rigdum- 
funnidos. 

These gentlemen can hardly hare fsdied to see why I 
introduced detailed descriptions of their comrades. The 
most curious problem in the life of Scott could receive 
no fair attempt at solution, unless the inquirer w^e 
made acquainted, in as far as the biographer could make 
him so, with the nature, and habits, and manners of 
Scott's partners and agents. Had the reader been left 
to take his ideas of those men from the eloquence of epi- 
taphs — to conceive of them as having been capitalists 
instead of penniless adventurers — men regularly and 
fitly trained for the callings in which they were employed 
by Scott, in place of being the one and the other en- 
tirely unacquainted with the priane requisites for suc- 
cess in such callings — men exact and diligent in their 
proper business, careful and moderate in their personal 
expenditure, instead of the reverse ; had such halluci- 
nations been left undisturbed, where was the clue of 
extrication from the mysterious labyrinth of Sir Walter's 
fatal entanglements in commerce? It was necessary, 
in truth and justice, to show — not that he was without 
blame in <he conduct of his pecuniary afiairs — (I surely 
mcuie no such ridiculous attempt) — but that he could not 
have been ruined by commerce, had his partners been 
good men of business. It was necessary to show that 
he was in the main the victim of his own blind over- 
confidence in the management of the two Ballantynes. 
In order to show how excessive was the kindness that 
prompted such over-ccmfidence, it was necessary to bring 
out the follies and foibles, as well as the better qualities 
of the men. 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSOK. 5 

Before I proceed to business, I iDay as well toss 
aside two or three dirtinesses, volunteered parentheti- 
cally. It is insinuated, that when John Ballantyne^s 
repositories were examined, on his death in 1821, Sir 
Walter Scott, one of his executors, " took charge of,*" 
that is to say, carried off without right or warrant, a 
certain "Collection'* of the defunct's papers; and that 
I, fifteen years afterwards, equally unwarrantably and 
unrighteously made use of these same papers for the 
disparagement of John's character. Imo, The collection 
of papers which Sir Walter " took charge of consisted 
of his own private letters to John Ballantyne, pasted by 
John into a folio volume, inscribed on the back, in 
John's handwriting, " open kot, read not." This 
volume was found at Abbotsford, some time after Sir 
Walter's death, and transmitted to me in London. I 
knew nothing, and could know nothing, of how it had 
found its way to Abbotsford, but most undoubtedly 
considered its contents as at the disposal of Sir Wal*' 
ter's executors. It was, evidently, their lawful pro- 
perty ; and I now know that John's Trustees handed 
it to Sir Walter the moment they ascertained what its 
contents were, on the ground that nobody but be 
could have any right to it. But, 2t/o, The Pam- 
phleteers assume that the " Collection" included the 
Autobiographical Sketch of John Ballantyne's Life, 
which I printed in my fifth volume, p. 77. It did 
not. That Sketch is in the possession of a most re* 
spectable gentleman in Edinburgh, who has a fancy 
for autographs. I have not the honour of his acquaint-* 
ance, but he, considering the document as a curious 
one, courteously placed a copy of it at my disposal, 
through Mr. Cadell, my publisher, long after I had 
become quite familiar with the still more curious con« 



6 LETTBR TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 

tents of the " Open not, Read not'' volume. If the 
Pamphleteers will apply to Mr. Cadell, his friend will 
no doubt open to them the original, with all the name3 
which I read, but opened not. Willingly would these 
delicate worthies have inscribed /* open not, read not,'' 
upon more and weightier documents than poor Johnny's 
fragment ! But, Stio^ I did not print that fragment with 
any design of disparaging the auctioneer's memory — • 
exactly the reverse. It was introduced for the purpose 
of proving, as far as any thing could be proved by a 
document in that handwriting, that John's volatile spirit, 
in spite of all its levities, had room for some serious im- 
pressions — one of bitter anguish connected with the 
distresses to which his early improvidence and folly at 
£elso had reduced him— -and one of deep and lasting 
gratitude towards the man who rescued him then, and 
sustained him ever afterwards. Had I Seen disposed 
to dwell on the darker side of things, at the very 
moment when I was commemorating his death and 
funeral, the Fragment might have afforded me ample 
scop^. I could easily have shewn, for example, the 
extravagant absurdity of John's assertion that the 
bookselling business conducted under his name left, 
when finally wound up, a balance of £1000 to the 
partners. There could have been no great difficulty 
in showing, that at the date (1817) of his alleged 
balance of £1000, his name was on floating bill» to 
the extent of some £10,000, representing part of the 
debts created by his own almost insane recklessness 
of mismanagement. But I saw no necessity for going 
into any such criticisms. If my reader had had any- 
thing proved to him, it was, that Scott lost a fortune 
by the bookselling speculation, in place of pocketing 
a profit by it when the accounts were closed. If, 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSOK. 7 

however, any reader of the book could have doubted 
that fact, the sequel of this letter shall satisfy him. 

Another point, extraneous to the merits of the case, 
may be as shortly dismissed. These " Refuters" have 
considered themselves at liberty to print some fragments 
of a private correspondence which passed between 
James Ballantyne and myself within a few days after Sir 
Walter Scott's death, and when James himself was in 
very bad health; and they are pleased to dwell on the 
kindly tone in which I then addressed him, as present- 
ing a striking contrast to. that of some chapters in the 
Memoirs of Scott, inasmuch as the letters in question 
*' must have been written at the very time when I was 
concocting" my so called " calumnies." They have the 
grace to speak of my " literary duplicity!" These are 
nice men, in the sense of Swift's definition — that is, 
men with nasty ideas. I was not quite in such a hurry 
as to be " concocting" a book about a friend and pa- 
rent before he was cold in his grave. My correspondence 
with James at that time originated in circumstances to 
which I would willingly have avoided any recurrence. To 
the coldness that had arisen latterly between him and 
Sir Walter, I was no stranger — and I think any candid 
reader will allow, that in my narrative I traced it fairly 
and regretftdly to the irritability of hopeless disease — for 
I expressed my conviction (Life, vol. vii. p. 289), that 
had Sir Walter been " quite himself," no change in 
James's views as to politics or religious dogmas --^&r 
less the frankness of his critical notes — could have pro- 
duced such an effect. I had given James credit for 
coming to the same conclusion on that melancholy sub- 
ject; and therefore, in common with the rest of Sir 
Walter's family and immediate friends, I certainly con- 
sidered it as strange, that during the last dismal months 



8 LETTER TO SIR ABAM FERQUSSON^ 

of Abbotsford, this early associate neither came thither 
himself, nor sent, nor wrote, to make inquiries or tender 
condolences. His non-appearance at the funeral, above 
all, surprised and vexed me, and the impressicm then 
made was conveyed to him, I know not by whom, to- 
gether with the particulars of Sir Walter's Last Will. 
He then addressed to me the following letter, which, in 
my answer, I might well characterize as a *^ manly and 
touching" one. 

" To J. G. Lockharty Esq^ Regenfs Parky London* 

" Edinburgli, No. 1, Hill Street, Oct. 28, 1832. 
" My Dear Sir, 

^' I write to you in circumstances of very considerable suffer- 
ing: in fact, I have been confined to a sick-bed for the last three 
months, not much short of fifteen hours d^ly, and with no very 
clear prospect of emancipation. But still I am very anxious to 
write to you a few words, briefly explanatory of some points in my 
conduct to my late illustrious and beloved friend, and which I know 
to have been misconceived both by yourself and the other members 
of his family. 

" Ever since my adoption of the principles of the Reform Bill, 
Sir Walter Scott's conduct, to a certain degree, tjhanged towards 
me ; and as the measure progressed, and also, I may say, as his 
health diminished, the indiciee by which the change wa» made 
manifest became more and more conspicuous, till at length, after 
changing his address to me from ' Dear James,' to ' Dear Sir,' — 
' Sir,' — the thing closed by his positively, and for several months, 
refusing, or at least declining, to write to me at all. During the 
whole period of his writing his last productions, he confined his 
correspondence to my overseer and other servants, although I bad 
persisted in writing to him in my usual vein of frank criticism, con- 
scious that it did not become me to teaze him with any marks of 
my feelings on the occasion. 

'* This is not all. I had always in the course of every year been 
invited by Sir Walter Scott three or four times at least to Abbots- 
ford; and I may add, that I do not believe it ever chanced that. 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 9 

I Tisited him daring our long intimacy without having been en- 
couraged and authorised hj such an invitation. I might have 
done so, and have no doubt that, if I had, my reception would 
have been most welcome ; but what I desire to point out to you is, 
that I never did do so. All these feelings and considerations, on 
which I will no longer dwell, made me think it advisable to abstain 
from going to Abbotsford during nearly the whde last twelve^ 
months of his life ; not that I was such a flagrant nincompoop aa 
to have indulged in any pet or spleen against that illustrious man, 
and my most dear friend and benefactor, but that I really dreaded 
that my presence might carry increased acrimony into his feelings, 
and thereby injure his health and tranquillity. Had I obeyed my 
own emotions of respect and love, and been freed from this dread, 
I should have hurried to indulge in his society, if not to express 
the depth of my grief and sympathy. 

" Surely, my dear Sir, this is enough to say, and I say it with 
confidence, because I am sure that you will believe it. No — there 
is scarcely a man living who venerated Sir Walter so much, or 
who laments him more profoundly. I have now to conclude with 
the more immediate causes which have led to this intrusion on 
your leisure. 

" I find, that betwixt sickness and agitation immediately fol- 
lowing his death, I hastily and imprudently committed myself, by 
pledging my exertions to the readers of the Journal * to recall and 
record, should my health permit me, sundry anecdotes of the de* 
parted, known only to myself. I beg leave to say, in three unce- 
remonious words, that I now trample upon this pledge, by which 
I now find, what I shotdd have seen from the beginning, that I 
should thus enrich paltry scribblers at the expense of those who 
merit to know all that I can tell them on this interesting subject. 
I beg you will therefore understand, that I shall not permit an- 
other week to elapse without endeavouring to recall and relate, 
whatever my memory has been treasuring up during the last fifty 
years — for it is not less — regarding my intercourse with Sir 
Walter Scott. Mind, I do not say that they are very numerous, 
but they shall all be authentic, and a large proportion of them 
eminently characteristic. You will, of course, desire to have no 
more than the mere materials, and indeed I hardly expect to be 

* The Edinburgh Weakly Journal, of which James Ballantyne was Editor. 



10 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGXJSSOK. 

able to put them much into shape ; but this is to bring no dispa- 
ragement on my taste, for I she^l give you them all unboulted. I 
fear me 1 have few letters of any the least consequence, for our 
epistolary intercourse was chiefly on matters of business ; but my 
brother will look them carefully over, and send you all those that 
may appear to him to have any value. In short, with all the feel- 
ings of the fly on the wheel, I beg to assure you ^ of my zealous 
co-operation.' — I am, my dear Sir, very faithfully yours, 

James Ballanttne.** 

The result of the correspondence thus begun, was 
that I received from Mr Ballantyne very shortly before 
his death, the scattered memoranda of his intercourse 
with Scott, which were, three years afterwards^ inter- 
woven into my book, and which, when I did make that 
use of them, I of course still considered as " curious," and 
" precious;" though by that time, unquestionably, I 
eould not by any means have been justified in describing 
them as containing data sufl&cient to " keep me right," 
as to the most important parts of Scott's connexion with 
his printer. No. The materials for Sir Walter's bio- 
graphy were not to be collected either easily or rapidly. 
Many months elapsed after James Ballantyne's death, 
before I even dreamt of beginning to arrange and 
study them, and after I had begun, I was repeatedly 
thrown back, or called to a halt, by the unlooked- 
for arrival of fresh documents. The Ashestiel Frag- 
ment was, as mentioned in my preface, one of these 
discoveries. The " Open not. Read not" volimae was 
a second — and one which was of itself sufficient to per- 
plex some, and reverse others, of the notions which I 
had previously entertained concerning both the Ballan- 
tynes. A third, of even greater moment, was a packet 
of States and Calendars in the handwritmg of John — 
this turned up in 1835. A fourth revealed various con- 
fidential letters from the two Ballantynes to Scott, la- 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FER6USSOK. 1 1 

belled by Sir Walter's own hand, " Important." These 
were discovered in consequence of a last scrutiny under- 
taken at my earnest request, so late as 1836 — by 
Mr Cadell, my publisher, and Mr Isaac Bayley, the 
confidential agent of the present Sir Walter Scott. It 
was &om the documents thus gradually disinterred, but 
mably upon the authority of the two last budgets, that 
I adopted that view of Scott's connexion with the Messrs 
Ballantyne, which my work presents. And, before the 
reader closes this letter, he shall have enough of evi- 
dence, that had I been disposed to deal harshly by those 
persons, I might have used language severer by a great 
deal than I did employ. He will be satisfied that I 
confined myself strictly to what I considered as necessary 
for making out my broad case — that over James, espe^ 
cially, I stretched the veil of charity with no grudging 
hand. 

Even now I scorn to withdraw it one inch farther 
than these rash " Refiiters" have made absolutely ne- 
cessary for the defence of Sir Walter Scott's outraged 
memory, and of my own good faith as his biographer. 

It is not very easy to analyze this pamphlet. Topics, 
persons, circumstances, above all dates, are so porten- 
tously jumbled throughout, that I should think no reader 
of ordinary sagacity can proceed feur without asking if 
it be possible that any man could adopt such a plan for 
telling a true and consistent story. They begin with 
John Ballantyne's early adventures in Kelso and Lon«- 
don, jump to some correspondence between him and 
Scott in 1813, and then dismiss him abruptly with 
something about his funeral in 1821 — prudently allud- 
ing to no one incident of the least importance in his 
connexion with Scott. Then they skip to 1800, and 
the advice that Scott gave in that year to James Bal- 



12 LETTER TO SIR ADAM F£RGUSSON% 

lantjme, with the formation of their first partnerdbip in 
1805. After this they keep no arrangement what- 
ever : — printing concern and bookselling concern, first 
contract of partnership, second contract of partnership, 
personal debts, company debts. States, Calendars, Led^ 
gers, private letters, bills, discharges — all the affairs 
and documents of nearly thirty years are intermixed in 
every possible wantonness of perplexity. At p. 27, they 
are busy with a Memorandum of 1823. Immediately 
after this they take up a Contract of 1822 (p, 28.) 
From 1822 they spring to 1826 (p. 29) ; fi-om 1826 they 
wheel back (p. 51) to January 1825 — firom that they 
wheel still farther back fp. bS) to 1822 again ; — the 
next page is stuffed with absurdities about accounts be- 
longing to 1826, 1827, 1829, 1830 : at p. 59, we have 
them once more deep in 1822 ; at p. 62, ditto ; at 
p. 63 they are again in 1826 ; at p. 67 they are in 1833 ; 
— and aft^ various other ingenious turnings and twist- 
ings, these disciples of Dogberry, " primarily and to 
conclude," at p. 73, invite our attention " first of all" 
to an occurrence of 1808 I Amidst so many windings I 
may not be able always to follow them — but I shall at 
least endeavour to keep strictly to the order of Time^ 

The main statements in my narrative which they 
undertake to refute as " Misrepresentations and Calum- 
nies" are, as they quote over and over again my words, 
that ^^ both the Ballantynes deeply injured Scott as men 
of affairs," and that " the day of his connexion with 
John, in particular, was the blackest in his calendar." 
But though they begin in a high key about John, they 
in effect care nothing for him ; they even seem willing 
to allow the substantial accuracy of *every thing I said of 
him, except that his states and calendars were such as 
Sir Walter Scott never could have understood. I am 



tETTER TO Sm ADAM FEEGUSSON. 13 

sorry to say I shall now be obliged to prove that they 
were such as could not have been prepared for any pur- 
pose whatever but that of mystifying Sir Walter. James, 
however, is their hero. He is the much-injured, innocent 
martyr, whom they are to vindicate fcom all reproach. 
I had alleged against him no worse offences than those of 
carelessness and negligence in the management of his 
commercial affairs. We shall see presently how he comes 
out of the more rigid SCTutiny which his idolizers have 
forced upon me. 

The pamphleteers announce, that ^^ by plain &cts, 
authentic documents, and indisputable evidence," they 
will refute " every imputaticm derogatwy ^o Mr [James] 
Ballantyiie." They assert, that " so far from Sir Walter 
Scott having been injured by his connexion with the 
Ballantynes, he was thereby greatly benefited"; that 
" his own large expenditure absorbed the whole profits of 
the printing establishment, and much more besides; in- 
volving the elder brother in ruin at a period of life whe% 
from the nature and extent of his business, he might 
otherwise have possessed a comfortable if not an affluent 
independence." " It is evident," say they, " that Mr 
James Ballantyne was eventually ruined by Sir Walter 
Scott." " His whole share of the profits, deducting the 
expense of his family, was floating in the business at the 
command of Sir Walter. He had cast his bread upon 
the waters, but it did not return to him after many days 
of labour and soirow. He lost all. Not a wreck was 
saved — not even his house, which had been bought with 
his wife's fortune, and which, in the fulness of his con- 
fidence, he had not taken any means to secure to her 
and her children." 

The partnership between Scott and James began in 
May 1805 ; and the Trustees of the latter carry badt 



i 



14 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGVSSON* 

their charges against the former even to that early date. 
" The profits of the printing concern," they say, " were 
at that time twice as large as those that are generally 
derived from this business now-arJays ; and if they had 
been applied to their legitimate puipose, they would 
soon have unwoven the meshes of any entanglement 
proper to the business." 

Thus, according to these gentlemen, there were " en- 
tanglements proper to the business" before Scott joined 
it, and had he not joined it to apply its profits to illegi- 
timate purposes — that is to say, " his own large expen- 
diture" away from the business — those entanglements 
must soon have been unwoven. Scott, in shorty was 
from first to last the incubus. His alliance was no sooner 
formed, than the profits were misapplied for his " private 
objects." Mr. James's share of the profits Q' deducting 
the expense of his family," elsewhere and repeatedly 
described as ** frugal,") was from first to last " at the 
command of Scott." Such was the fulness of James's 
confidence, that he even left his wife's fortune at the 
mere mercy of this ^^ all-absorbing" partner. He cast 
hid bread upon the waters — but it did not return. He 
lost all — he was ruined — simply, and solely, in con- 
sequence of his luckless connexion with Sir Walter 
Scott. 

Any person ignorant of the whole history of the men, 
except in as far as these Pamphleteers think fit to en- 
lighten him, would of course conceive, after reading such 
passages as the above, that James Ballantyne began life 
with a handsome capital — established for himself by his 
own unassisted industry and merit a flourishing (though 
" entangled") business — in a rash hour admitted a needy 
and unprincipled literary adventurer into partnership with 
him — soon perceived that the connexion was most bane- 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FER6U5SON. ^15 

fill to himseK — (for, as he always had the books in his 
possession, and received and paid every sixpence, he must 
have known who engrossed and diverted the profits, 
Scott at no time and under no circumstances, so &r as I 
have been able to discover, having ever subscribed the 
company firm) — yet, under the influence of some inex- 
plicable infatuation, persisted in maintaining the bond 
unbroken, until both he and his " fingal" family were 
beggared, towards the decline oi his life ; by which time, 
had his original capital, character, and industry been 
allowed fair play, he must have been in a condition to 
retire upon a plum. 

I shall not imitate the tellers of this story, by begin- 
ning with false assumptions, confounding dates, mangling 
accounts, piling one stupid or audacious blunder on an- 
other, and then ending with a dirge for a phantom. 

Sir Walter was the descendant of an honourable family 
— the son of a wealthy father. His patrimonial fortune, 
including bequests £rom an uncle and an elder brother, was 
not less than £10,000 — it probably reached £12,000. 
At the period when he first became James Ballantyne's 
partner, he possessed, independently of his literary re- 
sources, an income of about £1000 per annum. During 
the two or three years preceding their connexion, he had 
been so far from suffering under any shortness of means, 
that James acknowledges to have received two " liberal 
loans" firom him. Scott formed a partnership with his 
clebtor. 

The Pamphleteers speak of the father of the Ballan- 
tynes as a man " in easy if not affluent circumstances." 
At some period of his life he may have been so, with 
reference to the scale of things at such a place as Kelso, 
and his station there. His shop was one of a kind still 



16 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSON. 

common in little country towns — the keeper of such a 
shop is vulgarly styled a " Johnny AUthings." 

^^ From yonder window, in the solar beam, 

Red plushes blaze, and yellow buttons gleam ; ^. 

Here soap, ink, stamps, and sticking-plaster mix 

With hymn-books, Harvey's sauce, tea-trays, and candlesticks." 

The second son (Rigdumfunnidos) was, on his return from 
London, " entrusted," says the pamphlet, " with one 
department of the business/' This ^^ department''' was the 
tailoring one, — and I have been told that Rigdum was 
considered as rather an expert snip among the Brum- 
mells and D'Orsays of Kelso. His autobiography con- 
fesses that his devotion to sport and hardliving gradually 
but effectively destroyed his " department^" and not 
being aware, until lately, that the bther was alive when 
that was accomplished, I inferred — from John^s language 
about his ^^ goods and furniture with difficulty paying his 
debts" — that at the time when he was ** left penniless," 
the shop at Kelso was shut up altogether, and that, as 
happens almost always in similar cases in Scotland, the 
" goods," &c. were disposed of by auction. The Pam- 
phleteers may or may not be right in contradicting me 
upon these particulars — but of what consequence are 
they? Johnny admits that he was left "penniless;" and 
the reader will presently see reason to Conclude that the 
" easy, if not affluent" circumstances of the old man 
took the opportunity of vanishing about the same epoch. 
Certain it is, that precisely at the time when Scott 
enteied into partnership with James, John appeared in 
destitute plight in the Canongate, and was fixed on the 
new firm as " clerk," with a salary of £200 ; that the 
father and mother were then, or very soon after, esta- 



I.ETTBR TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 17 

blisfaed likewise in Edinburgh; and that, if there be 
any faith in the Accounts of the printing company, the 
old people also were thenceforth supported at its ex- 
pense. 

It is impossible to gather from the Accounts what 
capital James had really invested in the concern when 
the deed of copartnery (March 11, 1805) was executed. 
Johnny, the book-keeper, enters it as £3694 : 16 : 11 ; 
but the balance-sheet of the following Martinmas shows, 
that of this sum £2090 represented " stock in trade,'* — 
and that £1604 : 16 : 11 represented book debts due to 
James. What proportion of these book debts was ever 
recovered I cannot trace; and the " stock in trade" was 
certainly not clear. It is shown by the same sheet, 
that in the^ course of the year to which it refers, f(Mr 
payments (smiounting to £145 : 1 1 : 3) bad been made 
by the Company for types, &c. purchased by James pr©^ 
vious to the formation of the copartnery; and other 
payments of the same class figure afterwards. The 
accounts, in fact, leave no doubt that when the contract 
of 1805 was signed, James was largely in debt both in 
Kelso and in Edinburgh. Nay, it. will be shown very 
shortly, that an ingenious attempt was made to esta^ 
blish £500 of his nominal capital out of a cash-credit to 
that amount with the Royal Bank of Scotland — for 
which Scott was sole security! However, the deed 
bears that Scott was to advance £2008, a sum equal to 
Ballantyne's stock in trade, " including in the said 
advance the simi of £500 contained in Mr Ballantyne's 
promissory-note dated 1st February last, and £40 also 
advanced to Mr Ballantyne" — Scott to have one-third 
»hare in the concern, Ballantyne two-thirds — his extra 
third being his remuneration as manager. 

In the first State the very first entry is a payment on 



18 LETTBR TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSON. 

behalf of James Ballaatyne for ^^ an acceptance at KeUoy 
£200"; and a few lines lower we have, " Advances to 
his father, £270:19:5." 

In addition to the above, Jameses private expendi- 
ture during the fibrst six months of the partncfrship was 
— he being then, and for eleven years afterwards, a 
bachelor, — £722:1:1. 

According to the Pamphleteers, Scott induced James 
to come to Edinburgh for '' private objects" — which 
objects were attained as soon as he was installed as 
James's partner-^ since, from that imhappy hour, simple 
James left his " profits floating in the business .at the 
x^ommand of Sir Walter." For the hero of such a tale, 
it must be allowed James starts well. During the first 
six months of the concern his profits, according to his 
own Accounts, were . ^ - £366 14 H 
His momed drafts were, according to the 
'. same documents, for the same period, £1193 6 
•For the second half-year, reaching to Whitsunday 1806, 

his gains amounted to . . • £419 15 4 

His drafts to . , • . £1185 4 3 

-^" 

James's profits, therefi>re, for the first year 

were, . . . . . £786 10 3 

Drafts for ditto, . . . £2378 4 9 



Excess (^ drafts aver proJitSy £1591 14 6! 
Scott, the one-third partner, has for the same year, 
—profits, • . ... £393 5 1 

His drafts were three sums — one of £20, 
. one of £30, and one of £60, = £100 

In short the " all engrossing" Scott, being entitled 
to about £400, drew from the concern £100; and the 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 19 

liapless victim, James Ballantyne, having a right to 
less than £800, took £2300. Thus fer, no question, 
Scott had a fine prospect of realising the ^^ private ob<^ 
jects" which induced him to lure the unsuspicious printer 
from Kelso to Edinburgh I 

It will surprise no one who considers that printers* 
profits are not realized on an average under from fifteen 
to eighteen months, and observes the egregious dispro- 
portion of James's expenditure to the amount of his 
nominal capital, and even of his anticipated profits, — 
it will surprise no one to be told, that the Accounts of 
the concern, even in this first year of its existence, prove 
that recourse had already been had to accommodation 
paper. Three bills of that class are in the balance-^heet, 
amounting, together to £450. Neither will any one 
wonder that, when the year's accounts were to be ba« 
lanced, it was found necessary that some serious efibrt 
should be made to increase their available funds. Scott, 
accordingly, on the 13th May 1806, advances £1000 
more to the joint stock, and James pays in £500, bor- 
rowed by him from Mr Creech, bookseller. 

During the next year, ending Whitsunday 1807, 
Ballantyne's profits are entered as . £960 11 7, 

and his drafts as .... £816 9 10; 
but either the profits should be diminished, or the drains 
increased, by the two-third partner's share of John Bal- 
lantyne's salary as Clerk — which has been omitted, in 
making up the State, as a charge against the business. 

To Scott's profits and drafts for the same period the 
same remarkapplies. The former are stated at£480 5 10 
The latter at .... £75 

The accounts show an increasing amount of accommo- 
dation-bills. 

Between Whitsunday and Martinmas 1807, James 



20 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FBKGUSSON. 

again largely overdrew. The book-keeper enters, 
" Drafts on personal account," . £562 18 4, 

-:^i)itto " on his father's account," . £208 1 1 2; 
and, as if ashamed for once of these extravagant drains, 
as contrasted with a capital of £3000, part avowedly 
borrowed, he adds a note, which I must transcribe for 
your edification : — 

" In J. B/s personal expenditure of this half-year is included 
the interest he was due at last Whitsunday, all his taxes for the 
past year, and a horse and chaise for his mother^ besides an old 
account of furniture due Trotter, of J£86, settled and paid this 
one half-year, — these cause it so much to exceed the last," 

The payment of interest here recorded shows that 
James's demands on the concern were in part occasioned 
by old original personal debt; and it seems equally need- 
less to go into farther proof, that from the time of their 
migration to Edinburgh, his parents depended both for 
luxuries and necessaries on the freedom with which he 
felt himself entitled to overdraw those profits which the 
Pamphleteers consider as having " lain floating at the 
conmiand of Sir Walter." 

On the whole, between Whitsunday 1805 and Mar- 
tinmas 1807, it appears that Scott's drafts on the busi- 
ness came to £306 : 4 : 3 — James Ballantyne's to 
£a966:4:n!! 

About this Martinmas 1807, Scott seems to have con- 
ceived some suspicions as to the real amount of the capital 
which his partner had put into the concern. I have not 
seen the letter in which he requested explanation, but 
the answer to it, in the handwriting of the book-keeper 
John, is before me. That answer had not satisfied Scott ; 
and John's reply to another missing letter is also in my 
possession. I need not trouble you with either of these 
performances in extenso ; but I must extract the parallel 



LETTER TO SIR ADA&i FERGUSSON. 21 

passages touching James's cash-credit with the Royal 
Bank, because they illustrate, among other things, the 
veradous consistency of Mr John. 
In the first lett^ Mr John says — 

" When you formed your arrangements with James (to which 
chiefly is owing what he now is), I undwstood you were aware that 
he was not clearly worth the ^£2090 stock of which he was at that 
time in possession ; but that there were not only debts upon it, but 
other engagements .which he was bound to fulfil. Nevertheless, 
that this property, being tangible and present, was taken as his 
dear stock, subject only to be reduced by such drafts of money as 
he should actually make on the funds of the company. A part of 
this stock was created by a cash-account which he held with the 
Royal Bank. 

" The extension of the trade and buildings rendered it necessary 
for you to make further advances ; and as it was needful also for 
him to make equal advances, in order to maintain his equality of 
stock, he boiTOwed the money requisite ; and it appears to me that 
there exists no other difference betwixt the loan which he has from 
the Bank and those he has had from individuals, than the circum- 
stance, that the one are lent for an indefinite period, and the other 
upon an open account." 

He proceeds to argue, that this cash-account is in the 
same situation with any other advance — 

'* It is a responsibility on the monied partner certainly, but 
where there is so much realized property above all risk, and a 
proper confidence in the fidelity of statements, it is not a danger- 
ous one." 

In the second l^ter Mr John writes thus : — 

" At the commencement of the Company, James Ballantyne*s 
personal stock was taken to credit as his share of the joint stock 
of the company. This consisted (as per private ledger), of house 
in Foulis' Close, presses, types, materials, &c. &c. ; but in it was 
not included the £500 due by him to the Royal Bank. His ad- 
ditional stock since has arisen firom advances of money he procured 
as loan, as well as- he did this £500." 

I doubt not Mr John found it extremely difficult to 
give a clear and consistent account of his brother's 
input stock, or to explain whence it came. In this 



22 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSO^. 

second letter, he says, that amidst all the et ceteras 
the £500 dae to the Royal Bank was not included, 
and certainly it never x)ught to have been so; because 
a cash credit, for which both partners were equally 
bound, could not form a part of the stock of one of 
the partners. Nor was anythmg of the kind stipulated 
by the contract; in which, on the contrary, it had been 
settled that a separate stock account should be kept, after 
a " distinct valuation'* of Mr Ballantyne's stock had been 
signed by the parties. But in the former letter, written 
nearer the date of the transaction, we are told that a part 
of the stock wtzs created by this cash account, — that is, 
James Ballantyne created his stock by raising money on 
Scott's credit. Was this a fair and proper proceeding? 
and where is the proof that it ever was put in its true 
colours before Sir Walter ? Mr John, you see, expressly 
designates him as ^^ the monied partner," and admits, 
that his responsibility would be very dangerous, but 
for " proper confidence in the fidelity of statements." 
Scott's confidence was indeed very considerable, when 
he could go on, although the book-keeper either would 
not or could not tell him what Mr James's original stock 
actually consisted of! 

The rest of this second letter is occupied with sundry 
apologies for the disagreeable condition of the concern, 
resulting firom Mr James's drafts so largely exceeding 
all rule : Mr John is of opinion that nothing of this 
kind " can" occur again ; but a sinking fund ought by 
all means to be established for the liquidation of encum- 
brances ; and, he says — 

" It is therefore my decided idea, that the company should take, 
from the partner willing to advance it, j£1100 more at the trade 
allowance of fifteen^ per cent ; and that the sinking fund should be 
appropriated (if not occupied in a still farther extent of trade), 
towards his repayment." 



LBTTER TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSON. 23 

This proposal was agreed to* A minute was signed 
by Scott and James, by which it was agreed, that the 
whole stock should be constituted as at £6000, of which 
£3000 was to be held as the stock of each ; — << But 
in the event of either partner's placing or allowing to lie 
in the funds of the Company any sum exceeding their 
share of the capital, such partner is to receive on such 
advance a trade profit of 15 per cent/' This was quite 
a fair stipulation, and was ia truth nothing different from 
sharing the profits in a form perhaps the most dangerous 
to the monied partner, who would have found himself 
called on to increase his advances should the concern 
have begun to labour. Scott continued, as we shall 
see, his advances^ but the accounts and letters afford 
no evidence of his ever receiving interest upon any of 
them except once <h* twice ; — consequently he made a 
present to his partner of the difference on all subsequent 
balancings. James, it is already needless to say, never 
had any overrunnings of thai kmcL 
'^ Notwithstanding all the promises of carefulness as to 
future expenditure by which Scott was lulled, no 
amendment took place. One balance State (that fol- 
lowing the horse and chaise one), is amissing ; but such 
as they were, the rest are now before me, and the result 
(one half-year omitted on both sides), is, that — from 
Whitsunday 1805, when the company commenced, to 
Martinmas 1809, when all attempt at making out regu- 
lar balances seems to have been dropt on John's removal 
to a wider sphere of mischiefs- during these four and 
a half years, Mr James Ballantyne's profits are recorded 

as £3936 9 10 

His personal drafits, .... 5963 12 3 
Mr Scott's profits as . • . 1968 4 11 

His drafts as 1391 2 3 



24 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON, 

Thus, while Seott left undrawn of his share of the 
profits the sum of £577 : 2 : 8, the careful and prudent 
tradesman, James, had overdrawn his share by no less 
than £2027 : 2 : 5. So far as to the drafts of the partners. 
Now see how the money department of the business was 
conducted. 

Throughout this period accommodation-bills had been 
constantly increasing, and " the monied partner" had 
been compelled to make repeated advances. These new 
advances (subsequent to the £1000 in May 1806) are 
summed up in November 1809 at £3000. I say they 
are massed together for convenience sake, as making 
that sum ; for it is plain that the money had been sup- 
plied in driblets from time to time, to meet the exigencies 
of the mismanaged concern, not in one or a few consider- 
able payments, under the temptation of a trade rate of 
interest. James also, during this period, had increased 
his nominal share of the stock, but whatever he paid in 
for that purpose appears to have been borrowed from 
private friends — Mr Creech, a Miss Bruce, &c,,— repaid 
of course at a subsequent period from the Company funds ! 

We have now reached the date at which the ill-starred 
bookselling firm was set up, and hitherto John BaUan- 
tyne has appeared only as a clerk to Scott and James. 
Looking to the period when these alone were principals, 
how do the facts bear out the grandiloquent sketch of 
their relations, which gives the key-note to the whole 
of the pamphlet I am examining ? Even this fragment 
of the history I cannot pretend to explain completely; 
but I think I have shown that Scott was the only part- 
ner who brought any ready money into the business, 
and that his drafts on it were extremely moderate ; that 
James was in debt when it began, had no legitimate 
resources whatever but what it afforded, and commenced 



LETTSU ^rO tSia ADAM FBR60SSON. Sa 

and persisted in a system of most extraragant personal 
expenditure, to the grievous embarrassment of tfaos^ re- 
sources. Scott in those days had neither boi^ht land$ 
nor indulged in any private habits Ukely to hamper his 
pecuniary condition. He had a handsome income, no- 
wise derived from commerce. He was already a highly 
popular author, and had recdved from the booksellers 
copy-monies of then unprecedented m^nitude. With 
him die only speculation and the only source of embar- 
rassment was this printing concern ; and how, had the 
other partner conducted himself in reference to it as 
Scott did, could it have been any source of embarrass^ 
ment at all ? He was, I cannot but think, imperfectly 
acquainted with James Ballantyne's pecuniary means^ 
as well as with his habits and tastes, when the firm was 
set up. He was deeply injured by his partner's want 
of skill and care in the conduct of the concern, £uid not 
less so by that partner's irreclaimable personal extrava- 
vagance; and he Was systematically mystified by the 
States, &c. prepared by Mr John. In fact, every balance 
sheet that has been preserved, or made accessible to me, 
seems to be fallacious. They are not of the company's 
entire affairs, but of one particular account in their 
books only — viz. the expenditure on the printing work 
done, and the produce of that work. This delusive sys* 
tcm appears to have continued till the end of 1823, after 
wliich date the books are not even added or written up% 
But I am anticipating. Keeping to tlie early period 
prior to the bookselling adventure, it is, I think, clear, 
that James was in difficulties of his own creation before 
thepartnershipof 1805 commenced; and that, if Novem- 
ber 1809 found him a deeply embarrassed man, this was 
not in the slightest degree the result of his " profits" 
having lain in the business at the command of Su* Wal- 



26 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 

ter, but chiefly, certainly very largely, of his having 
lived (a young bachelor, bred in a quiet family in a 
country village) at a scale of expense unsuitable to hi« 
station, and unjust to his partner. 

And, however the senior Pamphleteers may choose 
now to disguise the fact — Iiowever little the facts of the 
case may have been understood by the lad whom they 
place in their front — both James and John Ballantyne 
have left abundant testimony of their conviction, that 
the concern thus dealt with owed all its original chances 
and opportunities of success to the personal influence 
of Scott It may be enough at present to quote the 
following passage from one of John's explanatory and 
deprecatory letters of Martinmas 1807. He there 



\ 



" Allow me to add, Dear Sir, that the pecuniary sacrifices yon 
have made for the welfare of the business have been duly appre- 
ciated, and deeply felt. . . . I assure you, much as you have done 
in a pecuniary point of view, that has been a very subordinate 
consideration in our estimate. The assistance rendered by you 
otherwise was altogether unattainable, and it is to the continuance 
of that upon which the business must depend for its advancement 
and success." 

The Pamphleteers are very indignant with me for 
having signified a suspicion that John Ballantyne's per- 
sonal ambition had some share in starting the book- 
selling house at the end of 1809; and they insist on 
tracing it wholly to Scott's disgust with the behaviour 
of Constable, or rather of his then partner Mr Hunter* 
In the Life of Scott, I to^d aU I knew about the quarrel 
with Htmter, and gave full allowance for Scott's feelings. 
But, firstly, John Ballantyne's recipe upon every occa- 
sion of embarrassment was extend your adventure ; and> 
RecDiidly, he was an exceedingly vain, presumptuous^ 



I 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON, 27 

and aspiring little fellow, and who that knew him can 
doubt that, of all the parties concerned m this new 
speculation, the one most zealous for starting it was he 
who had been for five years filling the humble position 
of clerk to the printing-house, and now saw the chance 
of presenting himself to the world in the comparatively 
elevated character of Walter Scott's pubKsher, and 
Archibald Constable's rival? Was I to forget the old 
rule, Cuifuit bonum? But the'point is of no sort of con- 
sequence. The only questions I am really concerned in 
are, Did not John most egregiously mismanage the new 
business? — and, especially. Did he not harass, torment, 
mystify, and deceive Scott throughout the whole period 
of its existence? 

The Pamphleteers try to kick up some dust about 
trivial secondary circumstances, but it appears to me that 
they give a reluctant assent to my view of these two 
questions. As to the second^ indeed, it would have been 
rather too brazen even for them to contest distinctly the 
evidence of the letters between Scott and the Ballantynes, 
which I printed in my third volume. If ever there was 
clear proof of one partner's being kept systematically in 
the dark by another, those letters furnished it: but I shall 
by and by give a few more specimens ex abundantid. 

It appears that I had examined the legal deeds in my 
hands too hastily, and was wrong in saying that Scott 
was only a one-third partner in the bookselling aflair: 
he had a half in the adventure, the other half being 
divided between the brothers. The documents show 
further, however, that Scott alone came down with money 
for the start : at all events, when he put in £1000 for 
himself, he lent James the £500, which was at the same 
time entered as that partner's share ; and he further ad- 
v^ced to the publishing house in June 1810, £1500 in 



28 LBTTEB TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSON. 

eash;* bringing his total capital embarked in the two 
•concerns at 'that date up to £9000, 

Hie Pamphleteers try to rescue their hero James from 
all blame in the embarrassments which soon gathered 
round the bookselling concern, by the bold averment, 
that this concern, in the management whereof James had 
but a subordinate part, occasioned new and unsurmount- 
able difficulties in the Canongate establishment, now 
wholly in his care, by running deep into its debt for 
printing. (See p. 24 of the " Refutation.") But this wiU 
not do. They are very willing to sacrifice John — but 
here I must defend him. As Scott alone had any money 
at stake in either of the concerns, it could have signified 
little to him eventually which of the two ran into debt 
widi the other ; but Johnny's autol»ographical firagment 
distinctly says: — " 1809 — already the business in 
Hanover Street getting into difficulty, firom our igno- 
ranee of its nature, and most extravagant and foolish 
advances to the printing concern. I ought to have 
resisted this, but I was thoughtless." In the Hanover 
Street company's State for 1810, I find the printing-- 
house entered as its debtor for £928. And not to 

* All this distinctly appears from a memorandum in John Bal- 
lantyne's handwriting. ** At the commencement of the publishing 
business Mr S. was to advance, without interest, to stock, £1000 
for himself, and ^00 for James Ballantyne's capital. He did 
advance in cash — 
'* 1809, 

** July 14 £900 

** Aug. 16. In account, - - 100 

-his own £1000. 

'' 1810, 
'* July 11. James Ballantyne*s capital, ad- 
vanced by Mr S. • £500 
*^ June 18. Mr S. lent the publishing-house, 

irncash, .... £1500. 



LBTTSR TO SIB ADAM FSftGUSSON. 29 

weary you, I shall add merely two or three extracts 
from the letters now before me. John, in the course 
of a very long communication to Scott, dated March 
16th, 1813, says— 

^^ This business has always been more or less difficulted, by all 
its capital, and £8000 more, being lent the pritOmg-office^ and the 
necessity of keeping up this advance by discomiting it from time to 
time. The profits of the office being nearly commensurate to the 
drafts made on it and the supplies of materials from year to year, 
tibis debt, once constituted, has never been reduced.** 

On the same sheet James writes as follows : — 

" Dear Sir, I have read over this melancholy statement, and 
have in truth nothing to add to it. Amidst my vexation and ap- 
prehension, it is some consolation to me that I cannot charge 
myself with any undue negligence in my department. I have 
nothing to] add, but my hope that I may not wholly lose your 
countenance and regard, which has for so many years been the 
pride of my life.'* 

On the 20th of the same March 1813, John thus 
re^mes to Scott : — 

" I entered the business with nothing, and of course must ex- 
pect nothing, unless it is realized on a final balance. I think any 
money you choose to raise should be applied in liquidation of the 
printing-office's debt to this business, as it seems to me impossible 
that it can continue to maintain, even for any period, a loan to the 
office of £&000r 

So much for the heavy embarrassment brought on 
the Canongate business by its advances to the Hanover 
Street company I 

Be it observed, that Scott had from 1811 come into 
the full enjojrment of an official income of £1600 per 
annum; that he had produced by this time his three great 
poems, and received in copy-monies altogether not under 
£10,000 ; and that he had purchased no land except, in 
the course of 1811, the original farm at Abbotsford,. 
price £4200. 



I 



30 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 

Now, for John's States^ aad mystifying mismanage- 
ment generally. It would be easy to fill a few, or a few 
dozens of pages, with figures — which very few persons 
would ever make even the slightest attempt to under- 
stand. But perhaps there are few who will not see at 
once the gross fallacy in the general summing up of 
John's very first State, June 27, 1810. This exhibits 
a debit of engagements to the extent of £7549 : lis ; 
sundry credits — the valuations of most in a thorough 
rule- of ^ thumb style, — making in all £11,465 :4s. 
Under which John writes, — 

" Balance of trade in fiivour of John B. & Co. 
£3905 : 13s." 

Now, how is this " balance of trade in favour of John 
B. & Co." constituted ? Read, and wonder. 
« Original Stock, . £2000 
" Loan from Mr Scott, 1500 
" Profit (besides support- 
ing the establishment), 405 13 0=£3905 13 0'' 
Both the " £2000 original stock," and the " loan of 
£1500," ought, as everybody sees, to have figured on the 
debit side of the page ; and the £405 : 13s. and no more, 
should have stood as " balance of trade." 

I am sorry to bother you so much with figures — 
but it is really necessary to pause a moment on this 
audacity. This book-keeper wishes to persuade Scott 
that the Company is flourishing, and he bravely claims 
for the credit side of his sheet, first the original stock of 
L.2000, and then Mr Scott's loan of L.1500. Why, 
according to this mode of computing, the more the Com- 
pany borrowed, the more was the balance of trade in its 
favour! If any other body had lent the L.1500, which 
is here taken as stock, surely John must have had perspi- 
cacity enough to see that this was not money belonging 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSON. 31 

to, but a debt due by the Compauy. So it would have 
gone agamst the balance of trade, and not in favour of it. 
But in stating the Company accounts, what difference did 
it make that Mr Scott wa3 the person who had advanced 
the money — except upon the principle that he was fair 
game for plundering? The Company was bound to 
repay him. It was still a debt, and not an asset — it was 
money to be repaid, and not a fund acquired. How Sir 
Walter could have shut his eyes to anything so plain — 
or seeing it, why he did not draw back from the despe- 
rate hazard in which he had already invested so much of 
his capital with such managers, — may be matter of 
wonder, and of deep regret. But what is to be said of 
the prudence — (I say nothing as to the candour) — of 
those who, under the pretence of defending the repu- 
tation of their deceased coiinexions, have ventured upon 
such a subject as this, and presumed to represent these 
Ballantynes as the dupes or the victims of their too 
easy benefactor ? 

A balance of trade of £3900 ought to have made a 
comfortable concern. John's own memorandum proves 
the reverse: — " 1810 — bills increasing — the accursed 
system of accommodations adopted." — And observe, this 
State refers to the half-year when the Lady of the 
Lake — the most popular and lucrative of all Scott's 
poems — was pubUshed ! 

This was John's formal State in June 1810. Before 
Martinmas came, Scott appears to have had considerable 
misgivings ; and no wonder, after what we have just 
seen. On the 23d October, he writes to James from 
Ashestiel : — " I wish John to take an exact account of 
his quire stock, and compare it with his catalogue. This 
should be done every quarter at leasts His last accounts 



32 LBTTEB TO SIR ADAM FBBQU880N» 

State the stock rotighly at ^ from £7 to £10,000/ Upoo 
your part, my dear James, if you are not able to put the 
[printmg] establishment on a more productive footings 
the necessary, though unpleasant c<msequence must be, 
an abatement of the dividends to the partners for next 
Martinmas." A delicate hint — alas I his hints to these 
gentlemen were all too delicate. 

To any practised eye that glances over Mr John's 
next State, Whitsunday 1811, it is plain that the con- 
cern in Hanover Street was already bankrupt. Before 
he received it, Scott seems again to have become appre- 
hensive and suspicious ; and had he handed the document 
to any experienced and honest brother of the trade, these 
feelings would not have been soothed by the grand items, — 
viz. engagements^ £l 0,453 ; actual means in hand, £379 ; 
book debts, £4718; and stock, £9720. The amount 
of the debts due to the concern — (some bad, of course, 
some doubtful, none immediately recoverable) — being 
only about £4700, while the funds on hand were under 
£400, any man of ordinary prudence would have looked 
with scrupulous anxiety to the manner in which the stock 
was estimated. It would have been rash to have taken 
it even at prime cost, as although some of it might have 
brought more than that, much of it must have brought 
less; and plainly the only just method, even for imme- 
diate winding up, but much more so with a view to a 
division of profits, would have been to estimate the 
whole at what it would fetch. John could have been 
at no loss to make such a valuation. But how was 
the stock estimated ? I have not been furnished with 
the valuation of the particular year 1811, but I have 
no doubt it was made up, like that of 1812 and 
all that followed, at sale prices^ or 10 per cent, un- 



LETTER TO SIR ABASf FERGUSSOK. 33 

der. In the balance now under consideration, it is put 
down, • - - £10,800 

10 per cent. (^, 1,080 

£9720. 

It would have been very absurd to apply this sort of rule 
to any book-stock, even such as was likely to continue to 
sell well — for at best sales are but progressive; and be it 
observed, if this principle were once adopted in fixing 
the partnership stock, and dividing profits from year to 
year, it had the effect not merely of exaggerating the 
present value, but of putting every subsequent settlement 
on a wrong basis. In this concern, however, what sort 
of stock was thus estimated ? Any one in the trade 
who reads the names of the books will be satisfied of 
the gross fallacy which Mr John's reckoning exhibited. 
For instance. The Edinburgh Annual Register — on 
which firom first to last there was a heavy annual loss 
— was taken into account as if every copy on hand were 
sold off immediately. For 8300 volumes of this unsale^ 
able book, John coolly sets down in one of his valuations 
" £6640 ! ** Then come large numbers of Hume's Eng« 
land, with Smollett's continuation, 16 vols»8vo., withroyal 
copies to boot; Miss Seward's Poems, 3 vols.; Jamieson's 
Culdees, 4to.; Kerr's Voyages, 17 vols. 8vo.; Life of 
Lord Herbert, 8vo. ; Castle of Otranto, 4to. ; Northern . 
Antiquities, 4to.; Grahame's British Georgics, 4to. ; 
Tales of the East, 3 vols, royal 8vo. ; Popular Ro- 
mances, royal 8vo. ; Beaumont and Fletcher, by Weber y 
14 vols. 8vo. ; and so on. We know fircan James Bal-^ 
lantyne (see Life of Scott, vol. ii. p. 332,) that before 
the end of 1810 the advance on the lumbering quarto 
entitled " Tixall Poetry," had reaehed to £2500 ; and 
there can be no doubt that the work was a miserable 
failure, and ahnost a total loss; Yet we have Mr 



34 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 

John estimating the stock of this work at 42s. per 
volume the royal, and 30s. the smaller size. Every 
journeyman in Paternoster Row who looks at such 
a catalogue will see that the whole stock of May 
1811 was not worth one-half, scarcely one-third, of 
John's valuation. The capital was already altogether 
swallowed up, and more than £10,000 of debt incurred 
besides. Well then might James, in his memoranda 
(Life, vol. iii. p. 56), lament over the recollection that 
" the large sums received formed no addition to stock — 
that they were all expended by the partners, then young 
and sanguine men, who not unwillingly adopted his 
brother's hasty results :" in other words, spent profits 
which had no existence except in these humbugging 
States. I may truly call them so, when I look at the 
results they present. The debts were upwards of 
£10,000. The stock, if truly valued, could not be worth 
£5000, or anything like it. The whole book debts were 
stated at £4700, and could not be worth above two- 
thirds of that money. The means on hand were £379 
sterling. The whole input stock was gone. Sir Wal- 
ter's £9000, put into this and the printing concern, wa« 
spent; and how spent we have seen. Such was the 
true state of the matter which ought to have been laid 
before him in 1811. John must have known this. But 
in place of telling him fairly — " We have computed 
our stock at the sale prices, — we have represented it 
at double its value, and in some instances stated our 
lumber at three times more than its worth, — our book 
debts are many of them bad, — our engagements exceed 
£10,000, — we have not £400 on hand, — will you go on 
deeper with this game, or will you stop now?" — I say, 
in place of telling the unhappy truth of the case — John 
indites a private note, accompanying the above-mentioned 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGU8SON. 35 

precious State-Paper of May 1811, in the following 
terms : — 

To Walter Scott, Esq. 

" Hanover Street, May 23, 1811. 
" Dear Sir, 

''^ 1 beg to enclose documents to which 1 request your perusal 
and attention, as I think they are so plain that a little notice paid 
them will obviate the darkling sensations you have sometimes 
expressed yourself as entertaining respecting our affairs. I think 
it matter of great congratulation the first balance on the two 
years* trade, from which you will observe that your XIOOO capital 
has grown £2064, being a clear profit of £^ per cent, per cnamm, 
— 1 am, &c. &c. John Ballanttne.** 

How could Sir Walter Scott understand the volumi- 
nous multiplications of figures set before him from term 
to term by such an accoimtant as this? There is no uni- 
formity in the construction of them : — the calculations 
of the value of stock are made in one instance at sale 
prices, without deduction of any per centage, sometimes 
on ten per cent, under sale price ; — but the fallacious 
principle runs through the whole — the same things that 
are estimated in the one way at Whitsunday, assume the 
other shape at Martinmas, but in the true and right 
shape — (what they would fetch if sold oflF) — they 
never once make their appearance. Totally different 
modes and forms are adopted and jumbled together, 
and the letters are constantly at variance even with 
these absurd balances in the States, 

No one who looks at these documents with the expe- 
rience of a man of business, can doubt that they were 
drawn up by a most unscrupulous hand. The first State 
puts the stock of £2000 and the loan of £1500 to 
the credit of the balance of trade. The second does not 



36 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSON. 

repeat this error, but it rates the book debts at their pre* 
cise amount, making no deduction for eventual loss, — 
estimates the stock in trade at prices at least a half^ 
and in some instances greatly more than a half beyond 
its actual value ; and thus, while the concern was truly 
insolvent, and Scott's capital was gone, he is assured 
that his £1000 has more than doubled, and that he 
is deriving a clear profit of fifty per cent. I Will any 
honest man stand by this conspectus of this Company's 
affairs during the first two years ? And, if not, who is 
to blame for the misrepresentation ? Is it Sir Walter, 
the sufferer by the loss, the only monied partner, but 
who had no knowledge of the details ? — or is it James, 
who continued to draw out of the concern largely, and 
'who at least ought have known, that according to the 
rules of trade these estimates were fallacious? — or, 
finally, is it John, and John alone, who was certainly 
a sharp clever fellow — and not likely primd Jitcie to be 
entirely incapable of distinguishing between a business 
gasping for existence, and one flourishing in the vigorous 
health of 50 per cent, profits ? 

One word more as to John's accounts. In my nar- 
rative I stated that he owed his dexterity in the mani- 
pulation of figures to having passed part of his early 
career in London, under the roof of a banking-house. 
On this head, the " Refutation" gives me a flat contradic- 
tion (p. 14.) It would, I suppose, be considered as (in the 
words of Johnny's own old Scotch lady)^ " no material 
to the story^'* whether he had acquired his accomplish- 
ments in that way, at a city banker's, or at Mr Willis, 
the west end tailor's. But I confess I was rash in as- 
serting that he had been in a banking establishment at 
fell — for I find, on examining my authority for the 
statement, that it was only his own word. According 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FER6USSOK« 37 

to Mr Cadell, my publisher, who was far more intimately 
acquainted with him in business than any other individual . 
now living, ^' when complimented on his skill in draw- 
ing accounts, he used to brag that he had not spent his 
dme at Messrs Cunies' for nothing.^ I trusted to this — 
and perhaps I was too hasty in doing so ; but I can at 
least show that Mr Cadell was not the only person to 
whom- he was in the habit of bragging that he had 
been Messrs Curries* disciple. The writer of the fol- 
lowing note is well known to have been an intimate 
friend of John Ballantyne's : — 

To Robert Cadell^ Esq.y St Andrew's Square^ 
Edinburgh. 

** Gulkne House, 6th December 1838. 
»' My Dear Sir, 

^^ I hare just received joxa note. I cannot of my own know^ 
ledge say whether or not John Ballantyne ever was in Curries* 
banking-house, but from what I have often heard him say, I am 
led to believe that he wot in the house for a short time. 

I am, my Dear Sir, yours very truly, J M— ," 

Enough ai the Hanover Street jf^^^rure^. What James 
thought of Johnny's book-keeping generally may be in- 
ferred from the conclusion of one of his epistles to Scott, 
penned soon after his brother's establishment as an auc- 
tioneer, when he (Rigdum) was on the Continent in 
quest of nicknacks for his sale-room. In this letter 
(September 19th, 1816) the printer bewails the embar- 
rassment he had been put to by the appearance of a bill 
against the Hanover Street Company, which Rigdum had 
neglected to enteror provide for — and proceeds thus.*^ 

*^ It is not possible I can be responsible for what he did or did 
not do, when by general approbation he managed the pecuniary 
concerns of the business. No man can lore, or for many reasons 



38 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON 

respect another, more than I do John ; but, with the black man 
in the play — ^ Cassio, I love thee, but never more be cash-keeper 
of mine/ " 

But I must return to the course of events. 

In a letter from John to Scott, dated the 1 6th of Msurch 
1813, he gives a very gloomy picture of the state of the 
trade generally, and of the necessity, in so far as they 
were concerned, of coming to some resolution. He 
says, that all the capital, and £3000 more, had been 
lent to the printing-office : that there had been great 
difficulty in keeping the concern agoing, with its " num- 
berless bills, and a great charge for discount. — However," 
he adds, " it has hitherto been accomplished, and greatly 
by your aid^ as the statements furnished from time to 
time, with prospective views of demands, and means of 
liquidation, have shown ; but we were also largely as- 
sisted by Gale and Curtis in September, and have since 
then been paying off their loan of bills. The result of 
our affairs is much the same as in May, but the diffi- 
culties now are very different." Mr John therefore 
suggests the necessity of either narrowing the concern, 
or winding it up altogether. Mr James adds a post- 
script, in which he says, he could not charge himself 
with any undue negligence in his department, plainly 
throwing the blame on Mr John. John writes again, 
on the 1 8th and on the 20th, and as usual goes into a 
long detail of his States and Calenders, as perplexing 
as any of the preceding. Great indeed was Mr John's 
faith in the credulity of his correspondent. Perhaps 
the most audacious specimen occurs in this last letter, 
where our gay fox-hunter (the true original of Jack 
Brag) assures Scott that he had, since the bookselling 
affair began, kept under the allowance to which the 
contract had restricted his personal drafts. His words 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 39 

are — " I know for my own part that I have lived upon 
the £300 per annum allotted, and can live, under other 
circumstances and in an inferior situation, on much less. 
I entered the business with nothing, and of course must 
expect nothing, unless it is realized on a final balance." 
It was quite true that he had brought nothing into 
the business ; but as to his having kept within £300 
a-year, he might as well have said under £30. All this 
while, according to the lowest estimate of those who 
remember the man and the time, he must have spent 
at least £1200 per annum: — it is needless to ask at 
whose cost. 

Sir Walter does appear at this period to have seen, 
at least to some extent, into the grand mistake, and 
its probable consequences. In the Life, about the 
period to which I am now referring, you will find more 
than one instance of his desire to rid himself altogether 
of his commercial adventures. Pray turn to p. 72 of 
Vol. Ill, where you will find him saying to John Bal- 
lantyne, on 1 0th August 18 13 — 

*' I cannot observe hitherto that the printing-office is pajing 
off, but rather adding to its embarrassments, — and it cannot be 
thought that I have either means or inclination to support a losing 
concern at the rate of £200 a-month. If James could find a mo- 
nied partner, an active man, who understood the commercial part 
of the business, and would superintend the conduct of the cash, 
it might be the best for all parties ; for I really am not adequate 
to the &t]gue of mind which these affairs occasion me." 

Again, on the 1 6th of the same month, he says (Life, 
vol. iii. p. 73) to John — 

*' With regard to the printing, it is my intention to retire from 
that also so soon as I can possibly do so with safety to myself, and 
with the regard I shall always entertain for James's interest/* 

And a few pages farther on, you will find him, in a 



40 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSOK. 

letter to James, pdbiting to a winding up, stating that 
he had no debts but those arising from these affairs, and 
making up his mind to lose all he had advanced. Alas! 
this would have been a small sum compared to what the 
rolling stone at last accumulated on his head; but it 
was no part of the Ballantyne policy to lose hold of such 
a partner. 

It was said in the Life, vol. iii. p. 74, that a volume 
might be filled with evidence^ from Sir Walter's corre- 
spondence, of the anxious perplexity in whidi he was 
kept by the blind unbusiness-like proceedings of both 
John and James during 1813 and 1814. I repeat the 
statement — I thinkl have already sufficiently established 
it — but I shall now exemplify its justice by a few more 
quotations. 

In a letter, dated the 22d of Mardi 1813, when the 
first crisis had occurred, James gives Sir Walter a long 
account of the state of thdbr affidrs. It would be too 
cruel to trouble you with the whole of it, but among 
other passages, it contains the following: — 

'^ It is thus evident that the hookselling could be supported 
only by credit ; and the best mode would have been for us to have 
limited it as much as possible. But unfortunately, as it now ap- 
pears, we did not. We ^nbarked upon various speculations, some 
of which — ^those in which you were concerned as author or editor — 
had great success — others the fair average the bookseller expects ; 
but a third class, and that class unluckily the largest in amount, 
though not the most numerous, with no success at all corre- 
sponding to the expense laid out upon them. Of those, Beaumont 
and Fletcher, and the Register, have been the heaviest hitherto. 
By these adventures nearly £15000 (perhaps more) of stock has 
been created without any capital whatever; and therefore that stun 
must be due by us to sundries,*' 

Mr James talks in the same letter of his own " frugal 
subsistence," — of the misery he had " long seen" in John 
— and finishes thus : — 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 4V 

" Haying said all that occurs, I shall conclude with assuring 
you, that you will find in John and me the most implicit compliance 
with tohatever you shall propose^ either for the general welfare of 
the business, or your own security. Whatever you propose I am 
confident it will be proper for us to agree to." 

Scott to John Ballantyne^ 

** 20t]i August I81S. 
*' The evil of this business is having carried on the concern so- 
very long — until its credit was wholly ruined — before having re* 
course to my assistance ; for what I have done ought to have cleared 
It, if the business had been in a situation to do anything for itself. 
But I will not do in my own case what I have condemned in others 
—•that is, attempt to support a falling business beyond the moment 
that it appears rational to hope for its being retrieved. I have nO' 
debts of my own of any consequence, excepting such as have been, 
mcurred in this unlucky business.** 

The Same to the Same. 

" Auguit 22,. 1«13, 
" I have every wish, to support the credit of the house — but if 
we are to fall behind JBIOOO every month, over and above what 
had been calculated and provided for, who can stand it?** 

JTie Same to the Same^ 

•* August 27, 1-SIS. 
" I blush to think of the straits I am reduced to — I who could 
hare a thousand or two on my own credit in any previous period 
of my life. As for sending me States^ they only confuse me. If 
the calendar be really perfect^ it is the best State for me. I am 
a^aid that all the acceptances you counted^ for October and No- 
vember are thrown back, as well as those for September. I must 
know how this is before I engage farther. It would be a fine 
thing if, after getting this credit, if it can be got, you should (that 
is^ the business should) a third time leave me in the hole to 
struggle for myself. For you must be sensible that by degrees I 
have beenleft wholly alone, and to tell you a secret, I would rather 
the business stood on your acceptances than mine.** 

D 



42 LBTTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON* 

The Same to the Same, 

" 6tli September 1613, 
** For God's sake look forward — ^how your own funds, and those 
provided in London, will come in to extinguish debts ; and remem- 
ber mine must be paid as well as yours. You know I cannot calcu- 
late how or when your bills will be discounted, though you can by 
taking the worst view. It is comparatively easy to provide for a 
difficulty seen at the distance of months, but who can trust to doing 
fio at the warning of days and hours ? Do take a well-digested 
view of this matter, upon a broad and extensive plan." 

The Same to the Same, 

«*28th AprillSH. 
** I have made up my mind, and arranged all my affairs, upon 
our last examination of the calendar, and I promise you I shall 
like very ill to be driven out to sea again. Why does not James 
hurry through the Lady of the Lake ? but he is a true Spaniard, 
who will not mend his pace though the house were on fire. Jamie- 
son's copy-money should have been entered in the calendar. No- 
thing has tended so much to cause and prolong the confusion of 
these affairs, as leaving out of view claims which ought to be paid, 
and are certain to he made,''^ 

The Same to the Same. 

" 17th October 1814. 
** Dear John, 

** I received your letter with the astonishing news of James's 
utter disregard to his own credit. He promised to let me have 
accounts of his prospects, and consult me upon the management 
of his cash affairs, but he has kept his word but lamely. He is even 
worse than you, for you generally give a day or two's notice at 
least of the chance of dishonour, and this poinding* is little better. 
His Kelso expedition has proved a fine one." 

James Ballantyne to Scott. 

" October 28, 1814. 
'' Dear Sir, 

** I have received your packet containing the preface to Wa- 

* Poinding is Angllce Distraint, 



LBTTEn TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON, 43 

Tferley, and copy for the poem. It is quite needless to say anything 
more of the poinding. It is one of fifty things which happen to 
sour the temper, and I hy no means wonder that you see the mat- 
ter under an aspect different from that in which I regard it, and 
apply to it epithets which do not strike me as justly belonging to 
it. Meantime, I trust the printing will cease to he that burthen 
which hitherto it has been. As to my own expenditure, I have 
not yet been able to take the funds for it with any thing like regu-> 
larity. On the contrary, often when I had appropriated a siun to 
pay my own little accounts, have I been forced to turn it into the 
channel of wages or bills. To this irritation I have no other hope 
than to be long subject. One glance will show that it cannot be 
otherwise. But as to despondency, I once more say I know no- 
thing about it ; and as to these taxes, they figured in my mind as 
no more than fifty other equal difficulties that at this moment press 
upon it equally. Had I ever had it in my power (I mean since I 
took up these affairs) to have a little before me, the case would 
have been different. In the way of retrenchment I do whatever 
I can. There are some objects which I do not retrench, simply 
because it is likely my mother has not long to live, and because 
I have not the fortitude to make her last days less happy than 
they have been. Thb, I must confess, compels me to one or 

two extravagancies, particularly my gig and my horse 

There is another claim for ^25, made up of old taxes due four 
yeara back on a place I had at Newhaven. I could just as soon 
pay the national debt sJt present, poind where they will. ^ A poor 
thing, Sir — Poor, miserable poor.* A^ to borrowing, I have 
pretty well got the better of shame, but really I don*t know any- 
body that would trust me. The cause of all this is to myself at 
least, perfectly clear and sufficient — beginning in debt, without ca- 
pital, and alvMys heavify in advance,*' 

N. B. — These last italics are Jameses own — and the 
advance he adverts to was the outlay on wages, &c., 
absolutely necessary to carry on the printing business. 

The extracts I have now given, illustrate sundry 
points besides the one I had mainly in view, — among 
others, the activity 2JiA frugality o{ the careful James. 
But before I leave the years 1813 and 1814, pause a 
little, I pray you, to peruse the picture which these let- 



44 LETTER TO SIB ADAM FER6USSON. 

ters present of this disastrous crisis, and of its causes* 
James admits, in his letter of 22d March 1813, that 
all the speculations in which Sir Walter had been en- 
gaged as author or editor were crowned with success — 
but he states, that the result of various others, notwith- 
standing of his own " frugal subsistence " — of which we 
shall see more by and by — had been to incur an out^ 
lay of £15,000 on bad stock without any capital ; and 
he promises, that if Sir Walter would still extend his 
c(mfidence, " everything should be done for his secur- 
rityJ^ Scott, on the other hand, in his letters of Au- 
gust and September complains — and most justly com- 
plains, — that the business had been carried on until its 
credit was ruined — without his being put in possession 
of the circumstances which, as a partner, and the only 
monied partner, he was entitled from time to time to have 
known — and that it was extremely hard that he who 
had no debt of his own should thus be involved in diffi- 
culties, for which, although legally, he was in no degree 
morally, responsible. He again complains, in April 1814, 
of the confusion which had been prolonged in these affairs 
by the concealments <^ the managers, and says that he 
should like very ill " to be driven out to sea again." 
God knows he had been long enough upon these 
troubled waters under such pilots I He saw, in Octo- 
ber of the same year, that James had ^^ kept his word 
but lamely," and that he had utterly disregarded his 
own credit. Yet, sdas I he was overpersuaded again to 
put to sea with the same comrades, and that upon ex- 
peditions of still greater peril. James in reply states, 
with great ndiveU^ that as ^ as he himself was con- 
cerned, the source of misfortune was clear enough — he 
had begun in debt and without capital ; — but, he adds, 
that he had never got (or taken) funds for his own ex- 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FSRGUSSON. 45 

penditure witb ** anything like regularity," and pro* 
mises to retrendi in every particular, excepting that he 
could not think of laying down the gig in which his old 
mother was accustomed to take her airings. Scott is over- 
come by all these frank and amiable protestations, and 
continues the voyage in the hopes of fairer weather, 
and steadier steering. Thus far I think we have fol* 
lowed pretty satisfectorily the commercial history of the 
literary adventurer who lured the Ballantynes from their 
native hills ** with private views of his own," — to wity 
views of speculating upon their capital and credit ! 

It is unnecessary to trace this painful history from 
year to year. But there is one event — I mean the 
marriage of James Ballantyne — the pecuniary arrange* 
ments connected with which bring out in the clearest 
point of view the relative position of the parties, and 
falsify beyond a doubt the charges of these Trustees. 
I had mentioned this matter in the Life of Scott very 
briefly, having no sort of wish to go into disagreeable 
particulars. One of the most shameless passages, how- 
ever, in the " Refutation," compels me to do what I 
then abstained from. The authors of this pamphlet, 
among their other marvels, choose to hazard the asser- 
tion, that James's £amily were ultimately injured to 
a very grievous extent, in consequence of his having 
left, besides all his " floating profits," his wife's fortune 
also, " at tibe command of Sir Walter." This makes 
it necessary that I should show distinctly in what pe- 
cuniary relations Scott and James Ballantyne stood to 
each other at the time when the latter entered on his 
matrimonial engagement. It will appear that the true 
nature of their connexion, and its results down to that 
period, were made known by Mr Scott's desire to the 
lady's family, before they gave their sanction to the 



46 * LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 

alliance, and they therefore should have ordered the man- 
ner of her provision, and secured it as they judged best^ 
with reference to the actual circumstances of the bride- 
groom. It is not my fault that Scott's letters to James on 
this occasion are not produced — I believe those I have 
all along had in my possession would be sufficient to ex- 
plain the business pretty fully. Nor is it my fault if any 
respectable persons shall now have their feelings wounded 
by the disclosure of matters, which nothing but this 
unwarrantable charge could have led me to lay before 
the public. I omit everything not inmaediately necessary 
to my purpose. James opens his romance in the follow- 
ing letter : — 

Mr James Ballantyne to Walter Scott^ Esq, 

«* Edinburgh, 15th October 1815. 
** Dear Sir, 

" Whether am I to discuss Paul first or something nearer to 
my feelings ? The something nearer certainly ; and then I shall 
discuss Paul with more patience. 

^^ Ecce iterum! — marriage again. But this will most assured- 
ly, in any possible result, be the last time I shall trouble you upon 
the subject ; for if a man is disappointed at the sober age which I 
have attained, he is little likely to try at it again, unless he lives to 
come to his doti^e, and then, to be sure, he maybe a fool. Now, 
to try how short I can make my tale. — 

" I have oftener than once told you of a certain lady, d*une cer- 
taine age, whom I had in my eye, though I never placed myself 
wittingly in her's. Well, it is not her. I found that mere ap- 
probation and civil regard were not fiufficient stimuli, and I ac- 
cordingly remained motionless in the pursuit. But — 

" There is a certain gentleman -farmer, Robert Hogarth by 
name, who has two stout sons and four comely daughters, whom 
he loveth passing well, and amongst whom, as a solid pledge of 
affection, he purposes to divide his fortune, which is understood to 
be very considerable. * * * 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSOX. 47 

« « « « « 

♦ «***♦ 
« * « « « 

« « « « « 

« « « « * ♦ 

« « « * ♦ 

« « » « « 

« « « * « 

« « « * « 

« « « « « 

« « « « « 

« * « « . « « 

« « « « « 

♦ « « « « » 
« « ♦ « « 

« • « « « 

« « « « « 

♦ • « « « « 
« « « « « 

« « « « * 

« * « « « 

* « « « . « 

'* Now for the reasons why I trouhle Cato with a love tale. In 
the first place, I am fully convinced of the mterest you would take in 
a step so important to me, independently of any other motive than 
the kind regard with which you have honoured me for so many 
years ; but I have other, and in truth imperious reasons for this 
early disclosure to you. Were the young lady porti^ess — mean- 
ing by that phrase, without certain views of a handsome fortune 
sooner or later — why no more would need be said than, You see 
how I live, my dear ; will you have me ? But the case is other- 
wise ; and I think it right to be very explicit respecting my causa 
scientue. ♦ ♦ * ♦ * 

* ♦ * * * 



48 LETTER TO dIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 

* « « ♦ » 

««««♦♦ 

« « « « ♦ 

« « « « « 

« « * ♦ « 

« * ♦ * ' * ♦ . 

***** 

* * * * * * 

" Supposing, therefore, all this to be correct, he will naturally 
enough enquire particularly into my property and prospects. 
Looking at me, as a stranger will naturally look, he will hold me 
at least to be unembarrassed and independent, if not rich ; and if 
he found that I was the former, I am satisfied he would be con- 
tent, and willingly leave his daughter to decide for herself. 
****** 
***** 

* * ■ * * * * 

♦ * * ♦ Now, I fear, I 

am in debt for more than all I possess — to a lenient creditor^ no 
doiibt; but still the debt exists, I am singularly and almost hope- 
lessly ignorant in these matters ; but I fancy the truth is, that 
owing to the bad success of the bookselling speculation, and the 
injudicious drafts so long made on the business which throve, I am 
dejure et de facto wholly dependent on you. All, and more than 
oily belonging ostensibfy to me, is, I presume, yours. If I am right 
in this, may I solicit you, my dear Sir, to put yourself in my situa- 
tion, and give me your opinion and advice. I will implicitly rely 
upon it, for I know no man so wise, and none more honourable. 
It will be hard, very hard, if from contingencies attaching no great 
portion of blame to me, I must resign this last hope; but I must 
never drag a kind and confiding woman into a pit after me. 

** In a particular manner, I wish to know how you desire 
that I should act respecting your own concern in my affairs ? My 
own opinion is, that a full confidential disclosure (li^Mted to the 
father and eldest son) would be not only honoiu*able to me, but 
useful to you. * ♦ * * * 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 49 

♦ * ♦ ♦ * 

♦ « * * « 
« « * Ht « 

^' I think I have nothing to add except this ^- that if I marry, 
it will make no permanent addition to my expenditure. The ^st 
year, perhaps, might compel me to trespass for an additional hun- 
dred or two^ though that is even questionable; for to the third 
daughter, who is on the eve of being respectably and opulently 
married, the old gentleman has been singularly liberal. * * 

« * « « » 4k . 

♦ * * * ♦ 

♦ ♦ « « « 

" If Saturday next passes as I hope, I shall do myself the plea- 
sure of passing a day with you, according to your kind and flatter- 
ing invitation, about the 241ii or 25th curt. God be praised, on 
your account, almost more than on my own, that we shall have no 
longer disagreeables to talk of; and that after all your cruel vexa* 
iioTU you know the extent of your loss. It has been great; hut few 
men have such resources. Peace and tranquillity are once more, 
I think, restored to you ; and hope is still mine. 

" I shall write about the printing-office when my mind is more 
at ease. Meanwhile the states are r^ularly kept up. I have had 
a sum of J6100 to pay for my poor father, being the very last, 
but still I have very little exceeded my allowance, not, I believe, 
at all, taking into it my salary for the Register, of which two yearis 
are due me. I am, &c. James Ballanttne." 

I fancy I have pretty well satisfied you that the book- 
selUng concern was throughoat on Scott's broad shoulders ; 
and there can be no doubt that so was also the printing 
one, down to October 1815, when James Ballantjme 
thus threw himself at Scott's feet for permission to pro- 
pose himself in form to Miss Hogarth. I have already 
said, that from the time of Johnny's removal to Hanover 
Street in 1809, no regular balances of the printing-house's 



50 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 

affairs were made up. The losses in Hanover Street 
have been pointed out, and also the diligence with which 
the "young and sanguine" Ballantynes spent the " gains" 
of that business, — which " gains" had no existence ex- 
cept in Mr. Rigdmn's " hast)'' results," alias deceptive 
States. It now appears plain enough, that from 1809 
to the close of 1815, no amendment in the conduct of the 
printing establishment had taken place. James, at all 
events, had persisted in his slashing encroachments upon 
the funds of that company : — " the injudicious drafts so 
long made on the business which throve" — the same 
business, nevertheless, which had been "a heavy burden 1" 
James confesses that his capital (whatever he ever really 
had possessed of capital) was gone — that his " profits," 
instead of " lying at the command of Scott," and being 
devoured by Scotfs " all-engrossing^ operations, had 
been entirely swallowed up by his own " frugal" expen- 
diture ; and that, over and above all this, he was so 
much in debt to Scott, that he could not stir an inch in 
the most important movement of his own life, without 
the gracious permission and generous aid of his " lenient 
creditor." Can anything be figured more conclusive 
than this letter? James, in October 1815, though he 
is courageous enough to deny that any great share of 
the blame lay with himself, does not presume to throw 
any blame whatever on Sir Walter. He admits that Sir 
Walter's losses had been great, and his vexations cruel. 
He himself had nothing to lose. He was so situated 
with his benefactor, to whom he owed more than all he 
possessed, that to marry without his consent was impos- 
sible. However, if that step be taken, it shall make 
no permanent addition to his expenditure — at most an 
additional hundred or two might be required for the first 
year. Sir Walter, as usual, gave way to the humble 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 51 

lover's entreaties ; and Mr James Ballantyne's pledges, 
en the other hand, were, as usual, ^^ kept but lamely." 
The three pieces following are without date of month 
or year — ^but I present them, in the order in which I found 
them ; and I presume the two first were written in Oc- 
tober 1815; the third, James's renewed supplication, 
about the 20th of December, the beginning of Scott's 
Christmas vacation. 

Scott to John Ballantyne. 

** I have written to James fully upon our affairs 5 he will of 
course show you the letter, and I think you will be of opinion, 
that although / cannot give up debts which are in afaxt way of being 
paid by a thriving concern^ and which owes its subsistence and pro- 
sperity in a particular manner to my advances^ ir^uence, and exer- 
tionsy yet I have placed him in the situation of a free unencumbered 
man, with a decent present subsistence, and very fair prospects. 
I shall be anidous to hear the result of his wooing." 

The Same to the Same. 

*' I trust James will act well and prudently; he seems quite 
pleased with the arrangements I have made for him, and I am 
very glad he is not suffering the view to cool." 

I shall have to return to these two notes by and by. 
Observe, meantime, that they prove two things — firsts 
that Scott never dreamt of relieving the Ballantyne 
establishments which owed every thing to his own pa- 
tronage, capital, and zeal, of the debts accumulated 
upon their books — ^which debts must at this time have 
amounted to many thousands : second, that, in his 
anxiety to promote James's personal happiness, he pre- 
pared to make some arrangements respecting those debts, 
which would relieve James individually firom their im- 



52 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSON. 

mediate pfessure. The next letter indicates that these 
proposed arrangements had been pondered orer very de* 
Kberately by the Hogarth circle. 

Mr James Ballantyne to Walter Scott* Esq. 

** Sunday Eveaing. 
" Dear Sir, 

^^ Since I left you in the morning I have had a conTersatiod 
with Geo. Hogarth, which has thrown more light than I could 
altogether wish upon my ftiture prospects, in regard to my con- 
nexion with his family. And yet things are not bad neither, I 
trust : — At least I am now sure of his good will, which I doubted 
before. 

^^ The marriage-day was fixed for the 1st of February, at least 
by the consent of Miss Hogarth, and the tacit approbation of the 
parents. But Geo. Hbgarth now gives it pretty clearly as hia 
opinion, that the marriage should not take place until the mutual 
discharge is executed in regard to the bookselling business, with- 
out which he argues, quite fairly, that his sister is not safe. Hb 
language was candid and re^ectful, and his whole manner kind ; 
but it was not the less apparent, that his own sentiments with 
respect to the propriety of the measure were decided ; and his 
sentiments, I have no doubt, will regulate those of his family. 
A demur respecting a pecuniary difficulty is precisely that which 
a wooer cannot remove by supplication or entreaty; and this, 
therefore , must stand until removed by other meaos. Until this dis- 
charge be executed, I see clearly the marriage will not take place ; 
and if it be long unexecuted, I fear it will never tak^ place at all. 
That the father should agree to the advance of his daughter's 
fortune, or any part of it, till this rub is removed, Hogarth plainly 
told me was not to be expected. There then we now stand. The 
wedding-day fixed, every thing prepared, the public (the few indi- 
viduals that we call the public) having their eyes fixed on our pro- 
ceedings, and this mid impediment starts up. Not even my anxious 
feelings upon the subject would lead me to ask you to remove this 
bar, did I see any additional injury or inconvenience which could 
reach you from doing so. But I see none. I therefore frankly beg 
leave to remind you, that you will, so far as I can discover, run no 
additional risk and suffer no additional has by agreeii^ to execute 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSON. 53 

this mutual discharge immediat^ly. You will have still the same 
hold over the whole proceeds of the P. office, reserving only my 
own livelihood, as you have now ; nor does it appear necessary 
that the public should know anything whatever of the transaction. 
You best know how a deed should be worded, to have the effect 
of maUng you as secure at present as tfuu could be afterwards^ and 
any 6uch deed I shall willingly sign. It will be severe upon me. I 
speak of the £act, not of your motives or actluns, which have always 
been most generous and kind to me and mine^ but it vdU be dread- 
fully severe if this important measure be killed by the delay of 
winding up a business, of which the general principle is completely 
understood, and which seems as ready to be finished now aft at any 
future period — I mean with respect to the mutual interests of the 
partners. 

^^ I am, I confess, very smxious ; for I have a sure conviction, 
that if the marriage be delayed from the 1 st of February until 
some future and necessarily indefinite period, it will be delayed for 
ever. The thing, I need not tell you, wotdd become ridiculous ; 
the public would titter and sneer ; a youi^ woman with £4000 or 
'JB5000 would begin to be laughed into the belief that she might 
do better than wait for a middle-aged man of embarrased fortunes ; 
the affair would blow up, and I should be completely discomfited. 

« « * * * 

' ^^ Until I receive your determination upon the subject, I must 
remain silent: and all must remain stationary. My future welfare 
hangs upon it. In fact, it is you who have the fixing of the mar- 
riage-day, or whether there is to be a marriage at all. To any- 
body else, this should be the text of a pathetic sermon ; but it i^s 
needless to you. I only wish you felt my pulse. 

^^ I have written, because it is far too late to trouble you with a 
visit. But my letter will reach you before you go to bed probabl v ^ 
and you will answer it the earlier, that you receive it before you 
leave town. — I am, &c. J. Ballantijie." 

I regret that I cannot produce Sir Walter's lettered 
upon this occasion ; but there is quite enough without 
them. It is now clear that Miss Hogarth's brother was 
informed of James's difficulties, and objected stoutly to 
let the negociation go on unless his affairs were put on a 



54 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 

satisfactory footing, which could not be done but by 
Scott's generosity. Something that satisfied Mr George 
Hogarth was done, and the marriage took place in Fe- 
bruary 1816. What that something was I will sKow you 
presently by irrefragable evidence :— as also that, when 
that something was done, James Ballantyne, indepen- 
dent of all other matters, was Scott's personal debtor 
in the sum of £3000. Meantime, I have no very cer- 
tain information as to the amount of Mrs Ballantyne's 
marriage-portion ; but I have reason to think that it did 
not exceed £1500. Nor do I know how any of it 
was invested, except, perhaps, £1000, which James 
paid in 1821 for a house in Heriot Row, being half 
of the price of the said house, the other half whereof 
he borrowed. The propriety of buying and removing 
to a new house in a fashionable part of Edinburgh, quite 
away from the seat of the printing business, when we 
come to consider the pecuniary status of James in 1821, 
may perhaps admit of some question ; but there is no 
question that the lady's legal brother was acquainted 
with the whole condition of things in January 1816; 
and that if James " left" any of the tocher " at Scott's 
command," he did not do so by paying off therewith 
the debt he had long owed Scott individually. I have 
thus placed beyond all possibility of cavil the baseless 
absurdity of the charge which these Pamphleteers had 
dared to raise against Sir Walter with reference to the 
affairs of Mrs Ballantyne. I have proved distinctly, 
that the Hogarth family were made folly aware of the 
relative position of Scott and James, when the marriage 
was arranged ; and there can be no doubt, that if the 
lady's portion was improperly bestowed, the responsi- 
bility lay, not with Soott, but with Ballantyne and with 
them. 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 55 

With respect to the debts of the two Ballantyne Com- 
panies, the arrangement proposed by Scott at this time, 
which called forth Mr James's grateful acknowledg- 
ments, and finally removed all the scruples of the 
Hogarths, was simply as follows : — Johnny's separate 
business as an auctioneer was now in a promising state, 
and all concerned were equally desirous of finally closing 
the bookselling and publishing adventure. The obli- 
gations of that firm and those of the printing-house 
were, however, by this time inextricably mixed up to- 
gether ; and as John had never embarked one shilling 
of capital in the former, which per se was utterly bank- 
rupt — its unsold book stock little better than dead-weight 
— the only commercial resources available for clearing 
off the encumbrances, were those of the latter business. 
It was proposed that the whole Ballantyne debt, there- 
fore, should be assumed by the printing-house, though, 
to avoid sudden alarm, a considerable proportion of the 
accommodation-bills hanging over Hanover Street, should 
still be kept afloat under the name of John, primarily. 
The printing establishment, then, was to take on itself 
the whole burden of both the mismanaged concerns ; and 
Sir Walter being now at the height of his career as a 
novelist, the employment of the presses was so vast, that 
there seemed to be nothing irrational in expecting that 
the profits of that establishment, if devoted strictly to 
the liquidation of the debt during a limited sequence of 
years, would suffice to clear off the whole. Sir Walter, 
in his large faith and easy nature, believed that Mr 
John had limited his personal expenditure to the sum 
allowed him as manager, and was willing, as he had ad- 
vance(^o capital, to hold him free of the ultimate loss 
in the publishing concern. He therefore says to James 
, — " the burthen must be upon you and me' — that is, 



\ 



56 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 

(m the printing-office. If you will agree to conduct this 
business henceforth with steadiness and care, and to 
content yourself with £400 a-year fix)m it for your pri- 
vate purposes, its profits will ultimately set us free* I 
agree that we should grant mutual discharges as book- 
sellers, and c(msider the whole debt as attachmg to you 
and me as printers* I agree, &xther, that the respon- 
{Ability of the whole debt should be assumed by myself 
alone for the present — provided you, on your part, 
never interfere with the printing profits, beyond your 
allowance, until the debt has been obliterated, or put 
into sudi a train of liquidation that you see your way 
dear, and voluntarily reassume yoiu* station as my part^ 
ner, instead of continuing to be, as you now must con- 
sider yourself, merely my steward, book-keeper, and 
manager in the Canongate.'' 

James eagerly acceded to this proposition, and firom 
January 1816, he was Scott's salaried servant, down to 
June 1821, when he took such a view of the business, 
its condition and its prospects, that he requested to be 
again admitted into it as a real, not a nominal partner — 
which he accorduigly was, by a new contract signed at 
Whitsunday 1822. 

All tlus I shall establish presently by documentary 
proof. Meanwhile, let us return to the order of time^ 
James accepts the airang^nent, and commences a double 
course of new existence — a married man, and the ma- 
nager of a printing-office, the whole of whose debts had 
been for the present assumed by Scott, while the whole 
of its profits (with the deduction of the manager's stipend) 
were to be applied for Scott's purposes — that is to say, 
after a fair remuneration to Scott for his advai^pes, in 
carrying on the concern, for the gradual obliteration of 
the old BaUantyne debts. It is clear that so long as the 



LETTER TO SIR ADAH FERGUSSON. 57 

arrangement should continue, James could have no right 
to use the firm resources, or the firm signature, except 
for the purposes expressly sanctioned by Sir Walter. If 
he were to draw a bill, for instance, in order to raise 
money for any purpose of his own, and sign it, not 
" James Ballantyne," but " James Ballantyne & Co." 
he would really be guilty of what I can hardly bring 
myself to name. 

You do not suspect James of such trespasses as these 
— and I at this moment believe that he was incapable 
of doing such a thing deliberately, and with a fiill sense 
of what so doing involved. However, not from any de- 
sire to press hard on James's character, but for a reason 
which you will by and bye admit to be conclusive, I 
must now proceed to a painful incident of October 1816 
— a few months after the stewardship commenced. 

On the 25th of this October, .James, the salaried 
manager, thus writes to Scott - - 

" It is needless for me to dwell on my deep regret at the dis' 
creditable incident which has taken place. I shall bind myself to 
a naked statement (and a short one) of the circumstances that led 
to it. Several months since, my brother Alexander told me, that 
owing to the impoverished state of the country he could not 
recover above 40 per cent, upon his accoimts, and that in order 
to keep his own credit he was compelled to desire me to repay him 
X500 of the cash for which he held the Company's acknowledg- 
ment. This embarrassed me greatly ; for I knew that the diffi- 
culties of our business were at least equal to kis^ and was at the 
same time aware that his demand would not have been made, had 
the necessity for it not been compulsory ; I therefore judged it 
advisable to try mif own means of raising thLs money, resolving not 
to trouble you upon ike subject tUl circumstances should become more 
favourable. The £200 biU lately ^honoured was given by me to 
John for an equal sum advanced by him, and paid by me to Alex- 
ander / 1 The remainder of the smn was made up in the same 
manner, and I have the absolute promise of the persons through 



58 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSOK. 

whom I raised it (Maimers and Miller) that they will aid nie in 
retiring the bills granted to them till it shall be convenient for me 
to retire them finally. By my strict economy and the aid of a pru- 
dent ufi/e^ together with a small sum which I got from her father, 
I had prepared myself for the payment of this £200, and I am 
now to tell you, light the blame where it will, the exact means 
by which the bill was dishonoured. I was aware that the bill was 
due on Monday last. I had a letter from John on the morning 
of Friday, saying he was to be at Abbotsford on that day on his 
way home, and that he would be in Edinburgh on Saturday. 
I left Edinburgh for Carfrae on Saturday morning, leaving £200 
inclosed in a letter for John to pay this bill, in the event of his 
failing to procure the cash in another quarter. In place of ar- 
riving on Saturday, John staid till Wednesday — a circumstance 
wholly out of my contemplation. The bill, of course, was dis- 
honoured, to my unspeakable vexation and sorrow. John*s man, 
however, got scent of this money which I left, and proffered it at 
the Bank^u^^ too late to save noting,** 

Note well, I beseech you, the terms of this letter, and 
the particulars of the disclosure of this " discreditable 
incident.^' Mr Alexander Ballantyne, a younger brother 
at Eelso, was, it appears, pressed for money, and called 
on James to pay up a debt of £500, not a Company, 
but a private debt. The concern in the Canongate was 
labouring under difficulties ; and in order to pay Alex- 
ander, a bill by the Company was discounted. James 
did not communicate the transaction to Scott. He sent 
the money to John, the auctioneer, to get the bill 
retired ; but by some accident the money was not re- 
ceived in due time, and the bill being dishonoured, was 
noted. Had it not been for this accidental circumstance. 
Sir Walter would never have heard of the bill at all. 
But what was discreditable in the incident, was not the 
accidental noting of the bill — it was the granting of it. 
Sir Walter seems to have been ill pleased, as he had 
good reason to be, with the transaction. On the 28th 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 59 

James again writes, protesting, as usual, that he had 
followed the strictest economy — 

" There was a time," says he, " certainly, when from being 
constantly kept from hand to mouth by John, and therefore in com- 
plete darkness, I far exceeded my income^ without either credit or 
comfort, or any kind of satisfaction. But since I myself had 
THE MANAGEMENT, I Can conscicntiously say this has never been 
the case. The claims of the business have never, not for a day, been 
postponed to my personal exigencies ; and your wants, in so far as 
I could influence them, would be more sacred still. At this moment 
I am stripped of every farthing in the shape of personal funds, to 
supply the deficiencies arising from JohrCs total mtscalcidation of 
Allan's matters ; and at this moment I am called upon to say, that 
I have not one shilling before me ; neither has mine been a bed of 
roses. / loas not aware of the terrible consequences arising from one 
acting partner'' s using the copartnery signature for his personal pur- 
poses, I assure you^ Sir, I should very nearly as soon forge your 
oum signature as use one which implicated your credit and property 
for what belonged to me personally. I respectfully beg leave to call 
to your recollection a very long and not very pleasant correspon- 
dence two years ago, on the subject of the debts due to my brother 
Alexander, and I may now shortly re-state, that the money ad- 
vanced by him went into the funds of the business, and at periods 
when it was imperiously wanted. No doubt it went in in my name^ 
to help up my share of stock equal to yours ; but I honestly confess 
to you, that this consideration never went into my calculation, and 
that when I agreed that the name of James B. & Co. should be 
given to the bills for that money, I had no other idea than that it 
was an easy mode of procuring money, at a very serious crisis, when 
money was greatly wanted; nor did I see that I should refuse it 
because the lender was my brother. His cash was as good as 
another's. Personally I never received a sixpence of it ! ! ! When 
my brother called up the money, he had the Company's obliga- 
tion therefor; and I thought myself warranted to pay him by 
means which did not increase the Company's responsibility, nor 
pledge their credit one guiifea farther. Had either of us died, 
this would have been apparent. There is £260 due in November 
in two sums, the 23d and 27th, which I have no means of satisfying 
bat by a renewal with the Company's obligation. I have nothing of 



60 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 

my own, and of course nobody will take my individual security. 
Sooner than pledge the Company's security again, I would go to 
jail — but in this instance, my going to jail would do no good, for 
the Company are already pledged" 

This trespass was too glaring to admit of excuse. 
James Ballantyne had no more right to grant the Com- 
pany's acceptance for personal advances to himself not 
connected with the affairs of the Company — or only in 
so far connected with them that they were applied to 
keeping up Jameses stock to what the contract required 
— he had no more right to do this, and thereby to bind 
Scott, without his knowledge and consent, for his (Bal- 
lantyne^s) private debt^, than, as he most justly observes, 
he had a right to forge Sir Walter's name. Accord- 
ingly it appears, by a letter dated the 8th of Novem- 
ber, that in consequence of Sir Walter'^s remonstrances, 
at a visit at Abbotsford, James had prevailed on his 
brother Alexander to give up one of the Company ac« 
ceptances for £500, and to take his (James's) own per- 
sonal acceptance in lieu of it. He continues — 

^^ The other ^00 paid to him from funds raised by pledging 
the Company's security in other quarters^ I cannot get quit of in 
the same way. That sirni must be carried on, because I have no 
funds of my own to retire it, and because I cannot ask others to 
take my personal security, although my brother has done so. But 
I trust the following short statement will considerably abate the 
strength of your displeasure on that score. The grounds of your 
displeasure are, that I, a partner of the firm, have used the security 
of the firm for a sum horrovyed by me for my own personal purposes. 
This, you renuirked, was a measure which, in the event of your 
death, would be most harshly represented, and might even be eofi- 
strued into wilful fraud on my part, — " 

The justification that ensues is perhaps as extraor- 
dinary as any thing else in James's conduct. He says, 
that part of the sums over-advanced by Sir Walter, and 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 6 1 

for which he was entitled to draw the trade profit of 15 
per cent, under the agreement of 1807, had been bor- 
rowed by him from his brother Major Scott ; and the 
security of the Company having been pledged for this 
advance, James attempts to liken the two transactions: 
— But, first of all, what does Johnny say? — His words 
are — 

" I was as completely unaware of the impropriety ofJameis ac^ 
cepting in the Jinn as himself, or I should not have suggested it. In 
truth, his own name would have done as weU, for this bill was paid 
to CadeD, not for value received, but as additional security over 
other assets, imder which he took on himself the payment of claims 
on me while I was absent. Of course, the circumstance will never 
occur again. I am sure the Bank are entirely satisfied that the 
money lay for payment from the Saturday preceding." 

James^ having stated, in direct opposition to John, 

that hi& own name would not do, tries to justify his 

pledging the Company's credit, and granting the draft, by 

referring to the source of part of Sir Walter's early (wcr- 

# advances to the Company, But it is impossible to figure 

two transactions more completely the reverse of each 

other in every particular, than those which James Bal- 

lantyne thus attempts to assimilate. An advance made 

to the Company, with the knowledge and consent of both 

the partners, and on which a trade profit was to be allowed 

under the contract, has no resemblance on earth to the 

using of the Company firm in a transaction with which 

the Company had no concern, and for the relief of the 

brother of one of the partners, without the knowledge 

of the other. Even supposing that Alexander Ballan- 

tyne had lent £500 to his brother James, who again 

had advanced it to the Company beyond the amount 

of his share, and for which, in that case, he would have 

been entitled to 15 per cent, profit — even assuming this 



62 LETTER TO SIB. ADAM FER6USS0i^« 

to have been the res gesta — which, however, Jameses 
own words utterly negative— it would hardly, in reality, 
have made the ^' incident ''^ in question one whit less 
** discreditable." Before James, even in that case, could 
properly have proceeded one step in granting such a 
draft, he ought to have communicated the whole matter 
to Sir Walter. In place of this, however, the true 
nature of the transaction is, that Alexander, who had 
made an advance to James " to help up^ his share of 
stock " equal" to Scott\ being in want of money, as 
he could not recover above 40 per cent, on his out- 
standing debts, applies to James for repayment of his 
persond loan. James complied by pledging the Com- 
pany's name, John says that James could have got 
the money upon his own credit just as easily. James 
tells a difierent tale, and admits he could not get it at 
all. The whole transaction is concealed from the only 
partner who from the beginning had any capital,— 
until it is accidentally discovered by the painful circum- 
stance of the Company's draft being noted. The pre- 
posterous apology offered is, that because Major Scott 
had enabled Sir Walter to make an advatwe to the 
Company over and above his stock, of which the part- 
ners were aware and had urgently desired, and which 
the Company were bound to repay — who the creditor 
was being a matter of no earthly consequence — James 
was entitled, without the knowledge of his partner, to 
pledge without value the Company's credit to his bro- 
ther Alexander. 

This episode, however, has not been introduced for 
the mere purpose of showing how Scott was used by 
James and John in the transaction itself, which they 
admit to have been ^' discreditable.'' No : It bears most 
directly on the main question which our Pamphleteers 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 63 

have thought fit to raise. We see that Sir Walter 
strongly resented the use of the Company'*s name and 
credit, by Mr James Ballantyne, for a private purpose — 
and that both James and John were driven to their wits' 
end for anything like an apology. The grand charge 
in the pamphlet is, that the Company'^s credit had been 
used by Sir Walter throughout for his own private ac- 
commodation. And I now ask whether the letters 
which I have been quoting do not form a conclusive 
contradiction by the Ballantynes of the whole charge as 
regards the period prior to October 1816 — not, to be 
sure, a contradiction in words, but what is far better, a 
contradiction in substance, and exemplified by conduct ? 
Sir Walter complains of this abuse of the Company'^s 
credit — this perversion of it to private purposes by the 
Ballantynes — and what is their answer? Is it to this 
effect: — "With what face do you complain of our 
having advanced a trifle of £200 to our brother, which 
we admit was a private transaction, unconnected with 
the concerns of the Company ? Be pleased to remember 
how your own private purposes have been served by 
the Company'^s credit, which you have used to the 
extent of many thousands, and blush for censuring 
us about a solitary violation of that contract, which 
you yourself have so systematically outraged." — They 
made no such answer, but on the contrary, knowing 
that Scott had not used the Company's firm for his 
own purposes, they attempt to palliate their conduct 
by contradictory accounts of their own necessities, and 
by referring to the matter of Major Scott, which had 
no bearing on the subject. These culprits take to this 
most irrelevant defence, while, if the theory of the 
pamphlet were founded in truth, they might at once 
have overwhelmed the accuser with an unanswerable 



64 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 

Tu Quoque — with what Alderman Wood, or Joseph 
Hume (I forget which), called " a Tu Quoquissime'' ! 

I shall not inflict upon you proofs in detail of the less 
culpable sort of mismanagement which ran through all 
the period of James's stewardship. His letters are full 
of apologies for neglects, and promises of amendment — 
but he maintains 'a comfortable aspect, on the whole, 
and repeatedly disclaims " despondency," Scott, on his 
part, continued, as of old, too much occupied with his 
own romantic creations to have time for minute scru- 
tiny of his commercial aifairs — he continued to pardon, 
to trust, and to hope. " No Despondency," was the 
word. 

In June 1821, John died.* The bills which had 
hitherto floated and expanded under his inspection, 
were now to be assumed directly by the Printing Com- 
pany — and James took this opportunity of renewing 
hints that he was weary of the Stewardship arrange- 
ment, and wished to have a new contract of partnership 
drawn up between Sir Walter and himself. It is neces- 
sary that I should lay before you several documents 
connected with this epoch of the history. Inter alia^ 
they will establish the accuracy of the statement which 
I have given respecting the propositions on which the 

* I stated in the Life of Scott, that John, inter alia^ left Sir 
Walter a legacy of X2000 to build a library at Abbotsford. The 
pamphlet coolly says that this legacy was not paid " for want of 
funds." The truth is, that over and above all commercial debts, 
Scott ultimately paid a round sum of personal debt of John Bal- 
lantyne*s. In how far John had deceived himself as to his pecu- 
niary status, I cannot undertake to guess. That situated as he 
really was, death should have arrested him in the midst of con- 
structing a splendid villa on the Tweed, and that he should have 
penned legacies when he could leave nothing but debt to be dis* 
charged by his Mends — even these circumstances are sufficiently 
in keeping with the whole of this person's history. 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSOX. 65 

marriage of 1816 was agreed to by the Hogarth £gimily. 
In fact, they supply as much as anybody would care to 
know as to the whole period between 1816 and 1822* 

In the 5th volume of the Life, p. 74, I gave an 
extract from a letter of James, in which he announced 
to Scott the appearance of very alarming symptoms in 
his brother John's bodily state. I djji not then think it 
necessary to quote the sequel of that letter, dated Edin- 
burgh, Sunday, 3d June 1821 ; but I must now do so, 
and pray mark well the admissions in this letter. After 
saying, in reference to John's condition, " My heart 
and soul are heavy within me," the printer proceeds 
as follows — (the italics and capitals represent his own 
single and double under-linings of emphasis) : — 

^^ With some unwilling foreboding that this might happen, and 
that John might be unable to assist us in our approaching arrange- 
ment, I have been studying the whole affairs of the concern with 
all the attention I could exert ; and as generally happens to per- 
sons of good sense, I have found that what others can accomplish 
I can accomplish too. I am very sure that in one week 1 shall be 
able to produce a statement, which, subject to your amendments, 
may prove a very sufficient foundation for a new contract betwixt 
tis. 1 do not pretend to think that I can make out a balanced 
account which would brook an accountant's examination ; but that 
happily you do not exact; and have kindly allowed for the former 
negligence, which renders that altogether impracticable. But 1 
am pretty confident that I can show how the concern stands with 
the world — what it owes, and what is owing to it; I can show 
what is the actual value of its present stock ; I am quite ready to 
agree to any terms you can propose for me ; and most zealously 
trust (and you wiU see I iviU not fail) to keep everything betwixt 
us, IN FUTURE, as regularly as the affairs of the Weekly Journal, 
Still, therefore, I look forward with hope and confidence to be 
useful both to myself, my family, and you. I am sure this is yet 
in my power, and I think you will believe it is, I may venture 
to say that I have never been idle, but, on the contrary, most 
active and assiduous in those parts of my business which Iliked^ — 



66 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 

trusting most absurdly to others to attend to the most important 
departments which I did not like. Henceforward I shall trust to 
myself alone ; and I really have no doubt that I shall manage 
everj'thing as correctTy as is my duty. With the deepest respect 
and gratitude — J. B." 

Hitherto I have quoted no document that was not in 
my possession when the life of Sir Walter was prepared 
for the press. I am now to lay before you one which 
came into my hands very lately^ through the kindness 
of Mr Andrew Shortrede of Edinburgh, a son of Scott's 
old friend the Sheriflf-substitute of Roxburghshire, the 
companion of the early Liddisdale expeditions. I might, 
indeed, have attained much the same end by inserting 
here the final contract of partnership between Scott and 
James Ballantyne ; but the following letter missive of 

1821, though its substance is repeated in the deed of 

1822, has a certain interest of its own as being in the 
handwriting of Sir Walter. It is shorter, too, than the 
formal contract that ensued* 

" Missive Letter from Sir Walter Scott to Mr James 
Ballantyne^ Printer in Edinburgh. 

" Edinburgh, I5th June 1821. 
*"' Dear James, 

*^ It appears to me that the contract betwixt us may be much 
shortened, by an exchange of missive letters, distinctly expressing 
the grounds on which we proceed ; and if I am so fortunate as to 
make these grounds distinct, intelligible, and perfectly satisfactory 
in this letter, you will have only to copy it with your own hand, 
and return me the copy, with your answer, expressing your acqui- 
escence in what I have said, and your sense of the justice and 
propriety of what I have to propose as the result of our investi- 
gatiofis and conferences. 

*' It is proper to set out by reminding you, that upon the affairs 
of the printing-house being in difficulties about the term of Whit- 
sunday 1816, I assumed the total responsibility for its expenditure 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSON. 67 

and its debts, including a salary of ^00 to you as manager ; and on 
condition of my doing so, you agreed that I should draw the full 
profits. Under this management, the business is to continue down 
to the term of Whitsunday next, being 1822, when I, considering 
myself as fully indemnified for my risk and my advances, am willing 
and desirous that this management shall terminate, and that you 
shall be admitted to a just pai'ticipation of the profits which shall 
arise after that period. It is with a view to explain and ascertain 
the terms of this new contract, and the relative rights of the parties 
to each other, that these missives are exchanged. 

" JFirst, then, It appears from the transactions on our former 
copartnery, that you were personally indebted to me in the year 
1816 in the sum of £3000, of which you have already paid me 
£1200, by assigning to me your share in the profits of certain 
novels ; and as there still remains due at this term of Whitsunday 
the sum of £1800, I am content to receive in payment thereof 
the profits of three novels, now contracted for, to be published 
after this date of Whitsunday 1821. It maybe proper to mention, 
that no interest is imputed on this principal sum of £3000 ; be- 
cause I account it compensated by the profits of the printing-office, 
which I have drawn for my exclusive use since 1816 ; and, for the 
same reason, such part of the balance as may remain due at Whit- 
sunday 1822, when these profits are liable to division under our 
new contract, will bear interest from that period. 

" Secundo^ During the space betwixt Whitsunday 1816 to 
Whitsunday 1822, I have been, Imo, At the sole expense of re- 
newing the whole stock of the printing-office, valued at £1700 ; 
2do, I have paid up a cash-credit due at the Bank of Scotland, 
amounting to £500 ; and 3ho, I have acquired by purchase cer- 
tain feus affecting the printing-office property, for the sum of 
£375 ; — which three sums form together a capital sum of £2575, 
for one half of which sum, being £1287 : 10s. sterling, you are to 
give me a bill or bond, with security if required, bearing interest 
at 5 per cent, from the term of Whitsunday 1822. 

" Tertio^ There is a cash-credit in your name as an individual 
with the Royal Bank for £500, and which is your proper debt, 
no part of the advances having been made to James Ballantyne 
& Co. I wish my name withdrawn from this obligation, where I 
stand as a cautioner, and that you woj^ld either pay up the account, 
or find the Bank other caution. 



68 LBTTER TO SIR ADAM FERGCSSOIT* 

^^ The above arrangements being made and completed, it re-' 
mains to point out to you how matters will stand betwixt us at 
Whitsunday 1822, and on what principle the business is after that 
period to be conductedr 

'* Primo^ At that period, as I wiD remain liable personally for 
such bills of the Company as are then current (exclusiTC of those 
granted for additions^ to stock, if any are made subsequent to this 
date, for which we are mutually liable, and exclusive also of such 
debts as were contracted before 1816, for ufhieh toe are also mutually 
liable,) I shall retain my exclusive right of property to all the 
several funds of the Company, book debts, money, bills, or balances 
of money, and bills in bankers* hands, for retiring the said current 
bills, and indemnifying me for my advances; and we are upon 
these terms to grant each other a] mutual and effectual discharge 
of all cliums whatsoever arising out of our former contract, or out 
of any of the transactions which have followed thereupon, excepting 
as to the two sums of X1800 and ^£1287 : 10s. due by you to me 
as above mentioned. 

^^ Secundo^ The printing-office, the house in Foulis Close, and 
all the stock in trade, shall* from and after the term of Whitsun- 
day 1822 be held as joint property, and managed for our c<Mnmon 
behoof, and at our joint expense ; and on dissolution of the part- 
nership, >the parties shall make an equal division of till balance 
which may arise upon payment of the copartnery debts effecting the 
same. 

" Tertio^ In order to secure a proper ftmd for carrying on the 
business, each of us shall place in bank at the aforesaid term of 
1822 Whitsunday, the sum of jCIOOO (to form a fund for carrying 
on the business, until returns shall come in for that purpose), — 
I say the input to be £1000 each. 

'' Quarto^ The profits of every kind after Whitsunday 1822 
(excepting works in progress before that period, and going on in 
the office) shall be equally divided, it being now found from expe- 
rience that the influence and patronage which it is in my power to 
afford the concern is of nearly the same advantage as yoiu* direct 
and immediate exertion of skill and superintendence. 

" 5to, Respecting books which have been begun before the 
term of Whitsunday 1822, but not finished till afterwards, I pro- 
pose, after some consideration, the following equitable distinction. 
Of aU such works as, having been commenced and in progress be- 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 69 

fore Whitsunday 1822, shall be publbhed or sent out of the office 
previous to Lammas in the same year, I shall draw the profit ; 
repaying the concern one half of the calculated wages expended per 
sheet or otherwise on the said works, subsequent to the term of 
Whitsunday* On the other band, the profit of all such works as, 
having been conmienced before Whitsunday 1822, shall not be 
published or delivered till after Lammas in the said year, shall be 
divisible betwixt us in terms of the new copartnery ; you in that 
case repaying me the moiety of such wages and expenditure as 
shall have been expended upon such sheets or volumes previous to 
Whitsunday 1822. 

" 6to, I think it would be highly advisable that our drafts on 
the business (now so flourishing) should be limited to £500 per 
annum, suffering the balance to go to discharge debt^ reinforce our 
cash-accounts, add to stock in case it is thought advisable, until 
circumstance shall authorise in prudence a further dividend. 

^^ It is almost unnecessary to add, that there must be the usual 
articles about the use of a firm, &c. But the above are the pecu- 
liar principles of the copartnery, and I should be desirous that our 
mutual friend Mr Hogarth, your brother-in-law, and a man of 
business and honour, should draw up the new copartnery, coupling 
it with a mutual discharge. He will be abetter judge than either 
you or I, of the terms in which they should be couched to be le- 
gally binding ; and being your connexion and relative, his inter- 
vention will give to all who may hereafter look into these affairs 
the assurance that we have acted toward each other on terms which 
we mutually considered as fair, just, and honourable. 

" The letter which I wrote to you at the time of yoiu* marriage 
in 1816, or about that time, explained completely the conditions on 
which I then undertook the management of the printing-office^ so far 
as cash matters were concerned s and as they were communicated 
to Mr Hogarth^ he will recollect their tenor. In case they are 
preserved^ I think you will find that they accord with what I now 
propose^ and are in the same spirit of regard and friendship, 
with which you have been always considered by, Dear James, yours 
very truly, (Signed) Walter Scott. 

*'^ Mr Hogarth will understand, that though the mutual dis- 
charge of our accounts respectively cannot be perhaps effectually 
executed till Whitsimday 1822, yet it is not our. purpose to go 



70 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FER6USSON. 

back on these complicated transactions, being perfectly satisfied 
with the principles of arrangment above expressed. So that if it 
should please God that either of us were removed before the term 
of Whitsunday 1822, the survivors shall not be called to account 
upon any other principles than those which we have above ex- 
pressed, and which I, by the writing hereof, and you by your ac- 
ceptance, declare are those by which we intend these affairs shall 
be settled ; and that after full consideration, and being well ad- 
vised, we hereby for ourselves and our heirs renounce and disclaim 
all other modes of accounting whatsoever. 

(Signed) Walter Scott." 

<< Edinburgh, 22d June 1821. 
^^ I hereby agree to the propositions contained in the prefixed 
letter, and am ready to enter into a regular deed founded upon 
them, when it shall be thought necessary. 

(Signed) James Ballantyne." 

This last paper is so pregnant with clear, broad facts, 
attested by both Scott and James, that I may spare 
myself the trouble of accumulating any supplementary 
evidence (as I could easily do) with respect to the rela- 
tive history of the men down to the month of May 
1822, when their final deed of copartnery was framed. 
You will at once allow that it has justified every jot 
that I said a few pages back about James Ballantyne's 
wedding — but as this affair is really the kernel of the 
whole controversy stirred by his representatives, you 
will pardon me for dwelling a little longer on the stipu- 
lations of the document. It proves, you see, the exist- 
ence of a heavy Company debt in January 1816 — and 
you have already had sufficient proof from the details of 
the "discreditable incident" of October 1816 — that 
of this Company debt no part had been created by Sir 
Walter Scott's employing the credit of the firm to raise 
money for " private objects of his own." Accordingly, 
the Stewardship period being about to expire, the mu- 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 71 

tual liability of the partners under the approaching new 
contract, is expressly reserved in these letters-missive, as 
respects the debt of the period prior to 1816. For obli- 
gations contracted between 1816 and 1822, Sir Walter 
was to be exclusively responsible, because the profits of 
that period ought to have been exclusively his — minu^ 
a Steward's salary. As to all the rest, the partners are 
to stand precisely on the same footing. The arrange- 
ment which Scott proposed in 1816 was exceedingly 
handsome — but it was not absurd. 

For the preparation of the formal contract of 1822, 
Sir Walter selected Mrs James Ballantyne's brother. 
We have seen that this Mr George Hogarth, a man 
of business, a writer to the signet, a gentleman whose 
ability and intelligence no one can dispute, was privy 
to all the transactions between Scott and James, where- 
upon the matrimonial negociation proceeded to its close ; 
— and that Mr Hogarth approved of, and Mr Bal- 
tyne expressed deep gratitude for, the arrangements 
then dictated by Sir Walter Scott. Must not these Trus- 
tees themselves, when confronted with the evidence now 
given, admit that those arrangements were most liberal 
and generous ? Scott, ** the business being in difficul- 
ties," takes the whole of those difficulties upon himself. 
He assumes, for a prospective series of five or six years, 
the whole responsibility of its debts and its expenditure, 
including a libefral salary to James as manager. In 
order to provide him with the means of paying a per- 
sonal debt of £3000 due to himself — and wholly dis- 
tinct from copartnery debts — Scott agrees to secure 
for him a certain part -of the proceeds of every novel that 
shall be written during the continuance of this arrange- 
ment. With the publishing of these novels James was to 
have no trouble — there was no risk about them — the gain 



1 



72 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 

on each was clear and certain, — and of every sum thus 
produced bjr the exertion of Scott's genius and industry, 
James Ballantyne was to have a sixth, as a mere bonus to 
help him in paying off his debt of £3000, upon which 
debt, moreover, no interest was to be charged. In what 
respect did this differ from drawing the pen, every four 
or six months, through a very considerable portion of the 
debt ? ScOtt was undertaking neither more than less 
than to take the money out of his own pocket, and 
pay it regularly into James's, who had no more risk 
or trouble in the publication of those immortal works 
than any printer in Westminster. The Pamphleteers 
must admit that James, pending this arrangement, was 
not the partner, but literally the paid servant of his bene- 
factor, and that while " the total responahility of tie 
debts and expenditure of the business" Igiy on Scott, Scott 
had the perfect right to make any use he pleased of its 
profits and credit. They must admit, that after the 
arrangement had continued for five years, James exa- 
mined the state of the concern, and petitioned Scott to 
replace him as a partner ; that so far from finding any 
reason to complain of what Scott had done with the busi- 
ness while it was solely his, without one word of com- 
plaint as to the large amount of floating bills so boldly 
averred in this Pamphlet to have been drawn for Scott's 
personal accommodation, James, in praying for readmis- 
sion, acknowledged that down to the close of that period 
(June 1821) he had grossly neglected the most impor^ 
tant parts of the business whereof he had had charge as 
Scott's stipendiary servant ; — acknowledged, that not- 
withstanding his salary as manager of the printing-office, 
another salary of £200 a-year as editor of a newspaper, 
and the large sums he derived from Novel-copyrights 
given to him ex mera gratia, — he had so miscon- 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON» 73 

ducted his own private ctffairs, that having began his 
Stewardship as debtor to Scott for £3000, he, when 
he wished the Stewardship to terminate, owed Scott 
much more than £3000 ; but that, acknowledging all 
this, he made at the same time such solemn promises 
of amendment for the future, that Scott consented to do 
as he prayed ; only stipulating, that until the whole at 
feirs of the printing business should be reduced to per-, 
feet order, debts discharged^ its stock and disposable 
funds increased, each partner should limit himself to 
drawing £500 per annum for his personal use. They 
must admit that James made all these acknowledgments 
and promises; that Scott accepted them graciously; and 
that the moment before the final copartnership was 
signed, James Ballantyne was Sir Walter Scott's debtor, 
entirely at his mercy; that down to that moment, by 
James's own clear confession, Scott, as connected with 
this printing establishment, had been sinned against, not 
sinning. 

The contract prepared and written by Mr. Hogarth, 
was signed on the 1st of April 18S2. It bears ex- 
press reference to the " missive letter dated the 15th 
and 2M of June last,^ by which the parties had " con- 
cluded an agreement for the settlement of the accounts 
6nd transactions subsisting between them, and also for 
the terms of the said new copartnery, and agreed to 
execute a regular deed in implement of said agree- 
ment ;^^ and ^* therefore, and for the reasons more parti- 
cularly specified in the said missive letters, which are 
liere specially referred to, and held as repeated, they 
have agreed, and hereby agree to the following ar- 
ticles.*" Then follow the articles of agreement em- 
bodying the substance of the missive. Scott is to draw 



i 



74 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FBR6USSON« 

the whole profits of the business prior to Whitsunda]^ 
182^9 in respect of the responsibility he had under- 
taken. Ballantyne acknowledges a personal debt of 
£1800 as at Whitsunday 1821, which was to be paid 
out of the funds specified in the missives, no interest be« 
ing due until after Whitsunday 1828. Sir Walter having 
advanced JPZ57S for buildings in the Canongate, new 
types, &c., James is to grant a bond for the half of that 
sum. It further appears by the only cash-book exhibited 
to me, that James, notwithstanding his frvgei mode of 
living, had quietly drawn £16^9 more than his alloW'^ 
ance between 1816 and 1822 ; but %A this^ as it is stated 
as a balance of cash, due by James at Whitsunday 1822$ 
Scott could not have been aware when with his own 
hand he wrote the missive letter. Sir Walter, I have 
s»id) was to be liable for all the debts contracted be* 
tween 1816 and 1822, but to have the exclusive right 
of property in all the current funds, to enable him to 
pay ofi^ these debts, and as the deed bears, ** to indemnify 
him for his advances on account of the copartnery^— i. e. 
from 1816 to 1822. Finally, Jamiss becomes boond to 

KEEP REGULAR AKD DISTINCT BOOKS, WHICH ABB TO 
BE BALANCED ANNUALLY. NoW| On lookiog at the 

import of this legal instrument, as well as the missive 
which it corroborated, and the prior communications 
between the parties, whom would an unbiassed reader 
suppose to have been the partner most benefited by this 
concern in time past, -« whom to be the person most 
likely to have trespassed upon its credit, and embar-* 
rassed its resources ? According to the pamphleteers, 
this person was not Mr. James Ballantyne^ — but Sit 
Walter Scott I 
'^ In the year 1822,'* they «ay, '^ James Ballantyne & Co. 



LBTTEB TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 75 

thought proper to balance their af&irs, and under scane new ai^ 
rangements, to enter into a new contract of copartnership. This 
instrument was executed on the Ist April of that year. The 
Vidimugy then made up by an agent mutuaUj employed by the 
parties, is now before us; and it shows that the bilis then xmrrenit, 
in the name of James B. & Co., 5af for Sir Walter ScMs privati 
uccommoda^n dhne^ amounted to ^26,896 : 5 : 1 1 ; whiie neither 
<il that time nor ivbseqttently was there a tingle accommodation hill 
current on account of the Company itself ^ p. 28. 

This truly is a bold * paragraph. First of all, let 
me respectfully ask of you whether these gentiemen'*s 
phraseology would hare conveyed to your inind the 
slightest notion of the actual res gestce^ either of January 
1816— or of June 1821— or of May 18M? Would you 
have gathered any suspicion that, from 1816 to 1822, 
Sir Walter Scott was to all intents and purposes " James 
Ballantyne & Co.?" I apprehend you could not. I am 
very sure you could never have guessed that the only 
document to which this passage refers, was drawn up 
by the same Mr George Hogarth, who had been con* 
suited as to the Letters Missive of 1821, and who penned 
with his own hand the contract of 1822 I I am very 
sure that Mr George Hogarth was not consulted by the 
manufacturers of this pamphlet ! His memory would 
have furnished, and his honour would have dictated, a 
very different tale. That gentleman knew weU^ what 
I have now made known to you, that when Scott made 
those " arrangements" for which Ballantyne was so 
grateful in January 1816, though he (Scott) assumed 
for a time the whole responsibility of the debts of the 
old Company, he did not do so because those debts were 
virtually and personally his own; — else why the deep 
gratitude of Miss Hogarth's admirer ? No — Scott 
generously took the burthen on himself, at the moment 



76 L1ETTBR TO ISIR ADAM FERGUSSOK* 

when but for him it must have crushed James BaUan** 
tyne to the dust : he was of a noble spirit, but he was 
not mad. 

Only turn back, I beg of you, to the closing para- 
graph of the missive of 1821. Scott, after having 
filled several pages with minute stipulations and provi- 
sions about old debts and new debts, &c. &c. &c. says 
to James Ballantyne, that in case a eertain letter of 
1816 had not been prieserved, Mr George Hogarth's me- 
mory would confirm his own impression as to its lan- 
guage upon the various points in question*^ Now I a$k 
a very simple question. Could there have been any occa- 
sion for reference to the memory of any third person, had 
the fact been — in one word — that in January 1816 
James Ballant}nrie ceased to have any debts at all ? 

Again — between 1816 and 1822, Sir Walter was enti- 
tled to all the profits of the Company, deducting James's 
stipend as manager — viz. £400, afterwards, it would ap- 
pear, raised to £500 per annum. But after this deduc- 
tion, and allowing for fair interest on the capital by which 
alone the printing business was kept going, how could 
the profits during the stipendiary period have sufficed 
for extinguishing the accumulated debts of the two 
Ballantyne Companies^ — debts the existence of which 
has been traced so plainly to the mismanagement and 
extravagance of the two Messrs Ballantyne ? 

The language of the contract of 1822 is, however, so 
clear, that I need not look beyond the letter of the record* 
Surely it would have been very strange if there had been 
a sum of upwards of £26,000 outstanding under accom- 
modation-bills for Sir Walter Scott's behoof .alone, that 
the contract should have been silent upon this subject, 
and that all the acknowledgments between the partners 



LETTER TO gSTR ADAMl FERGITSSOK. 77 

ishould have been for advances naade by, not obligations 
current for behoof of, Scott. Observe, again, the dis- 
tinct provision, that henceforth each partner shall limit 
the. sums to be drawn by him annually out of the profits 
of the business to £500, " the remainder of the profits 
being to be applied in discharging debts, en creasing 
the stock, and such other purposes as may be found 
necessary or beneficial to the Company, until such 
time as the partners shall find it prudent to agree to 
draw from the profits to a greater amount." Pray, what 
debts could have been in contemplation under this pro- 
viso, if Sir Walter had taken upon himself not the re- 
sponsibility merely for the whole of the old debts, but 
an explicit obligation for the payment of them out of 
his own proper funds without relief? The new Com- 
pany was to start, with buildings, presses, types, &c. 
all ready, and with a fresh capital of £2000 — (though 
I believe the Company books prove that James' share 
of this capital was all borrowed, and that it^ amount 
only swelled the Company debt at the catastrophe.) 
According to the hypothesis of these Pamphleteers, the 
concern to which this contract refers could have had no 
debts de facto, and ought to have had none in pro- 
spectu. And I wish you, finally, to try to guess why, 
if James was at this time responsible for no Company 
debts at all, he should have been so very eager to re- 
enter as partner into a " new flourishing" business, 
under express stipulation to draw only £500 per annum 
of its proceeds, until its debts should be cleared ? 

I must, however, come back once more to the terms 
-of the paragraph quoted from p. 28 of this pamphlet. 
After a reference to the contract of 1st April 1822, it- 
says — 

" The Vidimus then made .up by an agent mutually employed by 



78 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 

the parties is now before us ; and it 'shows that the bills then cur- 
rent in the name of James Ballantyne & Co., bat for Sir Walter 
Scotfs private accommodatioD alone, amounted to £26,896 : 5 : 11 ; 
whilst neither at that time, nor subsequently, was there a single 
accommodation-bill current on account of the Company itself." 

On the immediately preceding page, they*say— 

*-'' By a document before us, dated the 17th of April 1823, en- 
titled * Memorandum as to James Ballantyne & Co.*8 accounts,* 
it appears that the ^ amount of niscouNTS PAn> on Sib Walter 
ScoTT*B ACCOUNT, from 15th May 1822 to 17th April 1823,, being 
tfkven months^ was £1146:19:3!* — in other words, at ^ the 
rate of more than £1200 a-year, exclusive of exchanges on re- 
mittances and bill stamps. Two thirds of the entire profits of the 
business were thus expended in raising money solely for the ac- 
commodation of Sir Walter Scott.' " P. 29. 

Now, who could suppose that the Memorandum or 
Vidimus of 17th April 18^, quoted in page 29, is the 
same with that stated by the Pamphleteers, on p. 28, 
to have been made up in April 1822.^ Such, however, 
is the fact. There is only one Vidimus referred to 
throughout, and it is on the faith of this document that 
the charge is rested of upwards of £26,000 having 
been raised previous to 1822 for Sir Walter Scott's pri- 
vate accommodation. But a Vidimus of April 1823 
cannot be the Vidimus referred to in a contract of 1822. 
And, moreover, I beg to observe, that the Vidimus of 
1823 is not signed by either Scott or Ballantyne. I 
would therefore be entitled at once to throw it entirely 
overboard, as in noway binding upon Scott. It is said 
to be in the hand-writing of Mr Hogarth, and very pro- 
bably was some draft or rough sketch made up by him. 
But unauthenticated as it is, it is worth literally nothing.* 

* No copy was found among Sir Walter Scott's papers, and 
the one I am now remarking upon was produced by James BaU 
lantyne*s Trustees on my requisition.. 



LETTER TO SIB ADAM FBBGUSSON, 7^ 

In the next place, however, assuming it to be a docu- 
ment made up in terms of the contract, it does not prove 
that one shilling of the bills was for Sir Walter^s private 
accommodation. The words <^ private accommodation,'" 
which the Pamphleteers take the liberty of using, are 
not to be found in it. The bills which it refers to as 
Sir Walter''s, represent not personal debts of his, but 
the original sin of the two old Companies, increased con- 
siderably, it is probable, since 1816, by the expense of 
discounts — more largely, however, by the bills current 
at the death of John in 1821 — and named as Scotfs 
simply because they were the same that he had under- 
taken the responsibility of, under the circumstances and 
stipulations so often explamed already, at the time of 
Mr Ballantyne^s marriage. I repeat, that the word 
*^ accommodation^ is never once used in either missive, 
contract, or Vidimus^ and in none could the origin of 
the debt have been a material thing to settle, although, 
no doubt, like everything else belonging to both Com- 
panies, the advances had been obtained on Sir WalterV 
credit as the ^^ monied partner.^^ 

The right understanding of this Vidimtis^ which is 
the foundation of the whole calumny, will refute that 
calumny beyond the possibility of answer, knock the 
bottom out of the whole of these gentlemen^s pecuniary 
charge against Sir Walter, and demolish their precious 
Abstracty which they say (p. 61) '^ has been most care- 
fully prepared," and Which, if that assertion be true — 
I say has been most improperly prepared. I use the 
word advisedly, and I will make my assertion good. 
Look then at the entry in the Vidimus. It stands 
thus: — 



\ 



80 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSOK.- 

« « # 

" State of Debts due by and to Snr Walter Scott. 
" The amount of bills payaUe, now current, 

and to he pramdedfar by him^ is • . . £3Sfi54 11 3 
'' Amount of bills receiyable is ^6097 18 I 
1^ Outstanding printing accounts, 488 9 9 

^' Balance on Sir Walter Scott's 

account, 9,052 14 2 



£6586 7 10 £36,077 5 5 
'' Sum due by J. B» for which he 
has granted an assignation of 
bis life policy of insurance H! 2524 11 8 



9,110 11 6 



Balance £26,896 5 11 

" There is also Sir Walter's {UToportion of profits on printing 
to be placed to his credit in account with the Company, and one 
half of the stock of the Company. 

*' The amoimt of discounts paid on Sir Walter *s account, from 
15th May 1822 to 17th AprH, being eleven months, is£1146: 19:». 
Besides which there is the expense of exchanges, and stamps on 
remittances to Messrs. Curries, and bill stamps." 

I must pause for a moment to point your attention 
to the candid *' accuracy^ of this Vidirnm. The framer 
of it, whoever he was, carefully culls out the discounts 
paid on what he calls Sir Walter's bills in eleven months 
— but no hintj you see, that the ** frugal^ James had, 
within these same eleven months, squandered £2000 
of the means wherewith the bills in question were to be 
paid. More of this presently. 

To follow the particulars of the State : it shows the 
amount of current bills to be upwards of £33,000. But 
it does not establish that one single farthing of these bills 
had been discounted for Sir Walter^s accommodation. It 
is wholly silent on that subject. It shows that the amount 



LETTER TO SIE ADAM FERGUSSOK. 81 

of discounts paid betwixt May 1822 and April 1823, 
being eleven months, was upwards of £1100, and 
these are no doubt stated to have been discounts on 
Sir Walter's account — that is to say, they were dis- 
counts for the bills which had been transferred to Sir 
Walter — but the amount did not include one sixpence 
of discount for private accommodation of his, or uncon- 
nected with the renewal of Company bills so assumed 
by him. Nothing of the kind. This was never dreamt 
of anywhere till these accurate Pamphleteers were 
pleased to invent the fable, that the debt assumed by 
Sir Walter in 1816, was a debt of his own private con- 
tracting. The State shows, on the other hand, that he 
was entitled to receive of bills due to the Company, and 
of outstanding accounts, a fraction above d^6500-^and 
that he was also entitled to a sum of upwards of £2500 
due by James Ballantyne, for which his only security 
was an assignation to a policy of insurance. He made a 
bad bargain enough when he took upon him £33,000 
worth of bills, and got in return only £6000 of bills and 
£500 of printing accounts, and an assignation to a life 
policy for <j&2500. But this, under the Vidimus^ was 
the State made but against him — be it good or be it bad. 
Now observe, the bills receivable, outstanding accounts, 
and sum in the policy, amounted to £9110 :19:6; 
this is entered in the State as a deduction from the 
£36,000 of debt; and it leaves a balance of £26,896, 
«— this balance being, I say, the accumulated debt of 
1816, at this date. Well then, if there be nothing in 
this State to show the origin of these outstanding bills 
— rand certainly it is silfnt on the subject^-*and if the 
contract of 1823 proves Ballantyne to have been ScottV 
personal debtor — if the missive letters establish that 
Scott had b^en the creditor from 1816 down to 1821 



82 LETTEB TO SIB ADAM FBBGUSSON* 

— if Ballantyne could not marry without the consent 
of his lenient creditor — if all along Scott had been <^ the 
monied partner^— where is there a tittle of evidence 
to show, that because Scott took upon himself certain 
Company debts, he thereby acknowledged these Com- 
any debts to have been contracted for his own personal 
accommodation ? He never dreamt of making any such 
acknowledgement -»and it was not the fact. 

I must pause for a moment to call your attention to 
another small specimen of candour. A certain sum of 
£2524 : 1 1 : .8, distinctly recorded in the Trustees' own 
Fidimus of April 1823 as a debt of James to Scott, 
makes part of the sum of £9110 : 19 : 6, which the 
Trustees place at the top of their 60th page,* as the 
amount of assets to which Sir Walter was entitled to 
credit at the catastrophe of the Company — " He," say 
they, ** under an arrangement, was entitled to bills 
receivable, and other Company funds, amounting to 
£9110 : 19 : 6." Now, had they given the particulars 
o/this £9110, the fact that £2524 of it was a debt due 
to Scott by Ballantyne would have stared us also in the 
^ce, and'that alone would, with any reader of die least 
reflection, have blown the whole pamphlet. It would 
have proved their whole argument to be based upon a 
fiction or a delusion. And, by the way, how could they 
have reconciled it with their view of James Ballantyne''s 
character, any more than with their view of his pecuniary 
position ? He, by their showing, is an independent maa 
— Scott, by theur own story, overwhelmed with diffi- 
culties — (they represent Scott, at the moment when 
James acknowledges owing him this £2524 as well as a 
balance of cash of £1629, as personally encumb^ed 
with bill debts to the extent of £36,000) — and yet here 
they represent the independent affluent* James as not 



.^...J 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 83 

paying off the paltry £2524, but granting his creditor 
security over policies not payable until the day of his, 
the Bread-Caster'sy death ! 

Keep this in mind while we examine another grand 
charge which these candid gentlemen advance. They 
go on to say, that — whereas, in April 1823, as ap- 
pears by the Vidimus, the current bills and debt qfScoii 
amounted to £36,007 : 6 : 6 — at the date of the 
bankruptcy in 1826, Sir Walter^s proper liabilities 
under the contract amounted to £46,664 : 10 : 5. 
This would have made an increase of £10,657 : 5s. 
But then they say Sir Walter, ** under an arrangemeniy 
was entitled to bills receivable, and other Company 
/imds^ amounting to £9110 : 19 : 6;*^ and as this ought 
to have been applied in extinction of the £36,007 : 6 : 6> 
and was not so applied, the total increase upon the ac- 
commodations for Sir Walter^s behoof, betwixt 1822 and 
the bankruptcy in 18S6, was £19^668 : 4 : 6. In short 
Sir Walter brought, by his neglect to reduce the accom- 
modations, this additional debt of £20,000 upon the 
concern, and (p. 61) *^ in fact his large wants swallowed 
up every thing.*** I have already shown that the out- 
standing bills at the date of the contract were not his 
private debts, but were merely assumed till the Com- 
pany's profits should clear them off. Their amount was 
£36,000; but, say these sage accountants, they were 
reduced by bills receivable, and other Company funds, 
to £26,000, Now what were the bills receivable, and 
other Company funds ? The bills receivable were 
£6000, the outstanding printing-accounts were a trifle 
under £500, and £2514 was a debt due by James Ballan-^ 
iyne to ScoU. Now see the monstrous fallacy in these 
gentlemen's reasoning. Scott, Ihey say, ought to have 
reduced the bills current in 182S from £36,000 to 



84 Lettbr to sir adam fergusson. 

£26,000, because he was entitled to be put in posses* 
sion of £9110 : 19 ; 6, ** as appears by the Vidimus.^'' 
As respects £^500 of this sum, the utmost that Scott 
ever could have got was " possession" of an insurance 
policy. Another fund in hand was the outstanding 
printing accounts of £500. This will explain £3000 
out of the £9000 which Scott did not get; all that he 
could get, supposing the. bills receivable to be imme- 
diate ready money, was £6000 instead of £9000, to 
reduce the £36,000 of debt. 

But did he get one farthing of these sums ^- there is 
no evidence that he did ; and the presumption is that 
he did not— for James continued to take charge of the 
concern — large suras were required for carrying it on 
— the Company bills for the old debt had to be pro- 
vided for — and whatever funds could be got hold of^ 
were, it is obvious, applied to Company engagements, 
v/hether old or new, as they pressed. By no fault of 
Sir Walter's, accordingly, the £36,000 of 1822 became 
£46,000 in 1826. The Vidimus show^ that the dis- 
counts for eleven months, independent of the expense 
of exchange and stamps, cost £1 200 ; taking in round 
numbers the whole expense of carrying forward at this 
rate so large a progressive debt from IS22 to 1826, 
could not be less than £8000, — and for this we have 
the authority of the Pamphleteers themselves. 
Thus then the debt stood in 1822 at . £36,000 
The bills receivable, which it is said Scott 
ought to have applied in extinction of these, 
were ..... 6,000 



This leaves a sum for which he had no means 
of providing (except the Irish one of pay-- 
ing the sum James owed to him) of £30,000 



LBTTER TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSON. 85 

Renewals upon this large sum down to the 
bankruptcy, always increasing as the time 
advanced, .• . . . £8,000 



£38,000 
The total amount of the liabilities was . 46,000 



Making an increase, as against Sir Walter in 

this view, of £8,000 

instead of £19,000 and upwards. The irrefragable 
State, therefore, whose perfect accuracy ** may be relied 
on,*" is in this view wrong by £11,000 on £19,000, 
being more than a half. And I shall forthwith show 
who has to answer for the actual difference of £8000. 

Sir Walter, it will be said, ought to have applied the 
£6000 of bills receivable; to the diminution of the out- 
staifiding bills. No doubt, this might have been done 
had Sir Walter insisted on winding up the concern in 
18SS, and if he had adopted that course, he would 
have acted more wisely for bis own interest, than in 
accumulating by renewals those Company debts which 
he had taken upon himself, and which at last he was 
obliged to pay. But betwixt 182S and 1826, were there 
no monies of the Company over-drawn by Mr. James 
Ballantyne, and appropriated to his " own private pur- 
poses,'' which, if they not had been abstracted from the 
Company's purse, would have diminished the necessity 
for increasing the Company's obligations? The sums 
drawn by him are noted on the mar- 
gin, as taken from accounts in his 
own handwriting, and they amount to 
£9331 : 15 : 5, from May 1822 to Ja. 
nuary 1826. He was bound by the 
Company contract not to take more 



1822, 


^1339 6 


9 


1823, 


2219 15 


7 


1824, 


2842 19 


8 


1825, 


2276 3 


5 


182^ 


653 10 







£9331 15 


5 



86 LETTBB TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSON. 

than £500 a-year, or about £1760 ; —'so that here is 
an over-draft on the part of Ballantyne, in direct vio- 
Intion of the contract, of no less than £7381 : 16:6. If 
we compute interest on this insane expenditure we shall 
bring it considerably above £8000 ! And thus, Messrs- 
Trustees, you perceive that yours was not the only pos- 
sible way of accounting for " the increase of bills !" 
Why, supposing, for argument's sake, that all the bills 
current in May 1822 were Scott's, you must allow that 
no one knew their amount at that date so well as James 
Ballantyne — nobody could know so well as he, their 
origin and the mode of managing them — nobody could 
lie under a more sacred obligation not to swell their 
amount — and yet, Messrs Trustees, you must now 
admit that it was not Scott who increased their bur- 
then between 1822 and 1826 ! 

It does not appear that during this period Sir Walter 
drew anything in the name of profit, although some 
payments may have been made by the Company on his 
account, and the accumulated interest on the renewal 
drafts is all included in the grosss sum of debts proper 
to him of £46,000. Whether the £2600 due to him by 
Ballantyne, as stated in the Vidimus^ did or did not in- 
clude another sum of £1629, stated in the same paper 
to be also due by Ballantyne to him as a balance ofccLshy 
($r whether it included the sum acknowledged in the 
contract, I will not take upon me to affirm. Nor is it of 
the slightest importance — for this is abundantly clear, 
that out of the £9000 which James drew betwixt 1822 
and 1826, he paid off no part of his debt to Sir Walter .♦ 

* Two payments appear to have been made by Ballantyne to 
Scott, — one of £1250, in October 1823, and another of X1200, 
in July 1824 ; but from the entries in the Cash-book, it is obvious 
that James merely drew the money from the Company to pay to 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FEROUSSON. 87 

He spent the whole of that sum during the three years 
and a half for his own personal expenses — that is to 
say, he violated his contract by taking at the rate of 
.£2600 a -year, instead of £500. I feel very much 
inclined to print the entire particulars of this most in- 
fatuated man^s lavish proceedings in an Appendix, but 
shall content myself with an article here and there, the 
whole being from the " Cash Jottings,'^ in his own 
handwriting. These specimens may perhaps illustrate 
sufficiently the style of "frugaP Mr. James's opera- 
tions on poor Scott's purse : — 

1822, 
May 28. Bill, Robertson, ironmonger, £60 5 
June 12. Assessed taxes on Heriot Row, 34 11 1 
July 8. Geo. Montgomery, 4 doz. Ma- 
deira, - - 15 4 
„ 26. Cash, personal, - - 100 ! 
„ 30. Bill to Marshall, jewellers, per- 
sonal, - - - 41 1 6 
Aug. 1. Bill to John Wilkie, tailor, 41 9 6 
„ — Mr Bruce, auctioneer, - 80 
„ 24. Subscription to Astronomical 

Institution, - - 26 5 

Sept. 21. Falkner & Co. - - 20 19 6 
Nov. 6. Steele, for my son John'^s rock- 

ing-horse, - - 4 4 0!! 

his partner! The drafb for these two payments are not included 
in the £9331 above noted. Upon receiving one of these sums 
Scott tells James that he must now be " upon velvet," but ought 
to bear in mind *^ the babes and sucklings ;" meaning, of course, 
that though the private debt to himself was about to be cleared by 
James*s frugalUy^ he ought to persist in the same frugality, that 
is to say, not overdraw the stipulated £500 per annum from the 
business, but do his best to render the business a clear inheritance 
for his family. No doubt James promised. 



88 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSOK. 

18S3 
Feb. 17, Purchase, Sol-Generars sale, £102 15 3 ! 

„ 22. Mr Bruce, auctioneer, - 49 
Mar. 10. Pocket, at going to l^eviot 

Grove and Kelso, - 10 

April 18. Lindsay & Ca for wine, 25 14 8 

„ 24. Wardrop, do. - - 6 

„ 2a John Ranken, for glass, - 19 15 

May 21, Price of Goliah, gig horse, 50 ! ; 

„ 29. Wm. Dickson, further to ac- 
count furnishing drawing- 
room, - - 40 
June 20. Taken for expenses to Harrow- 
gate, - - 100 0! 
Nov. 11. Bought at Young's sale, - 55 5 
„ 1 4. Redeemed Assessment, 9 years 

for Queen Street Gardens, 82 8 9 
Dec. 6. Seven Sovereigns to my son 
John to., amuse him while 
confined, - - 7 0!! 

1824, 
Jan. 7. Sent to. Mr. Stillie, to be at 

my call on Journal account, 70 ! 
„ 12. CrichtoB & Co. one year of 

phaeton, 
„ 29. Sent Mr. Stillie for my call, 
Feb. 10. First and .second instalments 
to Edinburgh Academy, 
„ 27. Bill to Mr. Trotter, personal. 
Mar. 3. Subscription for repairs to Kelso 
Abbey, - . . 

„ 6. Ditto to Celtic Society, 
May 13. Horse, dennet, and harness, 
June 11. Wine at Captain Legg's sale, 
„ 14. Dick, a pony for my John, 
„ 16. A mare for myself, - 

1825, 
Feb. 3. Winq at Fotheringham's sale, 
„ 25. Lindsay & Co. wine, - 



26 





115 


0! 


80 





190 i4 


3 


5 5 





2 2 





90 


0! 


23 8 


0! 


10 5 


0! 


15 


.0! 


49 1 





11 3 


8 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 89 

1825, 

Mar. 26. Lindsay, for wine, - £9 15 6 

April 7. Mrs Hogarth, price of her gig, "25 
„ 29. Wine at Commissioner Errofs 

sale, - - - - 39 6 6 

Dec. 19. Cochrane, glass manufacturer, 50 

All these are independent of entries of cash paid to 
Mrs. Ballantjne, and innumerable personal accounts. 
This is the appropriation to their ** legitimate pur- 
pose'' of the funds of Baliantyne and Co. This is the 
taking " with due regularity'' the allowance under 
the contract. These are the family expenses which 

" SCARCELY EXCEEDED THE HALF OF HIS INCOME." 

Thesyntries show the " frugal habits" which James 
SO repeatedly promised to pursue, and of which the 
Pamphleteers assert and extol the strict observance — • 
and here is the diminished expenditure so necessary on 
the part of this prudent partner, whose all was swallowed 
up by the exigencies of Sir Walter. The Company 
bills required to be increased, and no wonder. But 
there was ** no despondency," and everything was kept 
comfortable at Heriot Row. New furniture for the 
drawing-room — wine at sale after sale — a rocking* 
horse, and then a pony, for John — horses, mares, 
phaetons — subscriptions to public institutions — assess- 
ments redeemed, and money *^ sent to Stillie for my call" 
— are items most characteristic of that rigid economy as 
to which, as well as in other matters, James Baliantyne 
*• kept his word but lamely." Why do I trouble you, 
who knew his habits well, with all this detail ? " We 
must speak to these fellows by the card." I show you 
my proofs step by step as I advance. James was taking 
the Company funds in violation of the contract. These 
sums were obviously Sir Walter's — they were raised. 

H 



90 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSOIT. 

on his credit — he eventually paid them— and if they 
had not been so squandered, his debts would have 
been by so many thousands less. You will judge, 
therefore, whether the increase of bills is more reason- 
ably accounted for by the overdrawings of one partner 
to the extent of above £7000 (with interest £8000 
and more), or the non-application by the other partner 
of the sums stated in the Vidimus to have been received 
by him, but which he never received, and which, to a 
considerable extent at least, consisted of a personal debt 
due to him by Mr. James Ballantyne. 

The remainder of their " Abstract," showing the 
gross amount of Sir Walter's liabilities, apart from his 
liabilities proper, I do not comprehend the oWect of 
introducing. The last part of the State exhiMts the 
whole responsibility as having been upwards of £88,000, 
But this has nothing to do with the question as raised, 
by these Pamphleteers themselves. The intermediate 
part refers to " Accounts, No. II. & III." to which I 
have had no access, and the nature of which I do not 
even know. I took it for granted, that when these 
gentlemen appealed to figured documents of any sort in 
a discussion of this nature, the writer whose statements 
they impugned had a right to be allowed firee access 
to the documents: I presimiie, if there could be any 
question as to the right in any other supposable case, 
there could be none in this case, where the documents 
must ex facie be considered as the common property of 
the two partners under discussion ; and I now ccmiplain 
that my request on that head has not been complied 
with. If you look to the bottom of their 60th page, you 
will perceive this sentence: — 

" Add excess of payments for Sir Walter, over sums received 
from him, as per account No. IIL, £17,142 : 18 : 10." 



. liETTSR TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 91 

" As per Account No. Ill !" Where is it? — Why 
do the " Refiiters" omit it? I think it very likely, th^t 
ninety out of a hundred readers of the pamphlet, in- 
cluding all the newspaper critics thereof, never remarked 
the omission ; but a very important omission I do hold 
it to be, and I, through my agents^ conveyed a formal 
request for its production. The answer was, that the 
Trustees did not choose to give me the perusal of a do- 
cument which they had made up, from the books of th^ 
Company, for their own private use, with considerable 
trouble ! 

No doubt, then, if they would not furnish ^^ Account 
No. Ill," they could and did produce such a set of books 
as, being carefully examined by competent men of busi- 
ness, would enable them to arrive at the result stated in 
the sentence above quoted? I am sorry to say — no 
such thing. The books and documents to which, after 
much delay, the Trustees at length gave my agents ac- 
cess, are such, that these gentlemen having scrutinized 
Aem with all possible diligence, tell me they can dra^ 
from them " no such result." The gentlemen I allude^ 
to are Mr Robert Cadell, my publisher in Edinburgh,, 
and Mr Isaac Bayley, the legal agent of Sir Walter 
Scott's representatives. It would be silly in me to pre- 
tend, that if the books were before me, I could examine 
them with half the skill that either of these gentlemen 
placed at my disposal, I must consider myself as fully 
entitled to adopt the conclusion at which they have seve- 
rally and conjointly arrived. 

The Trustees have declined, in like manner, to produce 
— and my agents make the same remark with referencte 
to the non-production of — the paper which the Trustees 
speak of as ^^ Account No. II," and appeal to as their 
authority, about ^* Exchange on remittances to. Lon- 



92 LETTER TO «IR ADAM FEROUSSOK. 

don," " Interest on advances by bankers^" &c. &c* 
&c. (p. 60.) 

The books which they have produced are in a state 
most discreditable to Mr James Ballantyne. There are 
no regularly kept books. The Trustees have exhibited 
none of the early ledgers : no cash-book for the period 
from 1817 to 1822 is forthccnning ; and the books after 
1823, are not even summed up. But I need not pursue 
this branch of the " Abstract" further. It is on the first 
part of it, which I ^have already handled, that their 
charge is rested — the charge of the bills taken by 
Scott upon himself, which are falsely assumed to have 
been for Scott's personal accommodation, being increased 
betwixt 1822 and 1826 by the sum of £19,000. Their 
Vidimus^ taking it as correct, although it apparently 
never was acknowledged or adopted by Scott in any 
way, unequivocally contradicts in most important par- 
ticulars the ^^ accurate Abstract" which is founded upon 
it by these Trustees. It neither proves that one far- 
thing of the debt contracted between 1816 and 1822 
was Scott's private debt — but the contrary — nor does 
it afford materials for the State so inaccurately based 
upon it, and so fallacious in itself — what then remains? 

Scott acquired the estate of Abbotsford, and lived 
in a style of great expense ; and it will be said, per- 
haps, that the accommodations of James Ballantyne 
and Co. were useful for his investments. These stood^ 
in 1828, as per the Vidimus^ at £36,000, and they were 
increased in 1826 to £46,000^ — an increase not at all 
unlikely to be accounted for by the renewals on the one 
hand, and the extra consumption of £8000 of antkipated 
profit by James Ballantyne on die other. If there be not 
a scrap of evidence to show that the oxigiiial debt of 
£36,000 in April 1823 wa^ created forSir Walter's prir^ 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM PERGUSSON. 93 

vate investments, all that I require to show, in order to 
complete his defence, is, that there were personal re- 
sources at his command, out of which the price of his 
lands and the expense of his household could, be paid. 
This can be very easily done. 

Scott, as we have seen, bought no land until 1811. 
(1.) He then made a purchase to, the extent of £4200 ; 
but before the end of 1810, he had derived from the 
Lay, Marmiott, the Lady of the Lake, &c. &c. not 
under £10,000. 

(2.) In 1816, Scott made his second and third pur- 
chases of land — ^the two amounting to £5119. In that 
year, James Ballantyne is acknowledged to be his per- 
sonal debtor for £3000; —and his writings betwixt the 
end of 1810 and 1816, including Rokeby, the Lord of 
the Isles, Paul's Letters, Waverley, Guy Mannering, 
the Antiquary, Old Mortality, &c. &c. had brought him 
at least £25,000. 

(3.) Between 1817 and the date of the missive let- 
ters of 1821, Scott had made various further purchases 
* of land to the extent of £19,764 ; but within the same 
period his literary profits were not under £45,000. 
In all, up to June 1821, Scott had invested in land 
£29,083 ; — but, in addition to his private fortune, 
he had been since 1811 possessed of an official income 
of £1600 per annum — and he had gained as an author 
£80,000. 

Make any allowance for building and planting (though 
neither had gone on on a large scale before 1821), and 
admire the modesty of the Pamphleteers, who quietly 
cushioning all these data^ as well as the real relations of 
James and Scott during the five most important years 
of the whole period to which the said data refer, " bring 
out the truth of the case" by suppressing all its main 



94 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 

facts. After this, believe if you can that Sir Walter, 
from 1805 to 1822, engrossed " for his personal behoof" 
^^ all the profits" of the Ballantyne busings, ^^ and more 
than all." Doubt if you can, that the Ballantyne busi- 
nesses, under the mismanagement of these worthies, had 
engrossed a very large share of the hard-won fruits of 
Scott's genius and labour — genius and labour alike 
wonderful, but not so wonderful as the long-suffering 
forbearance, unwearied kindness, and inexhaustible cha- 
rity of the man whom James Ballantyne's Trustees, 
" acting in concert with the family," dare to represent 
as the greedy rapacious plunderer of beings who derived, 
in fact, from his overflowing bounty, from the dawn of 
their manhood downwards, every jot of credit or con- 
sideration they ever enjoyed, every gratification their 
luxurious appetites and ludicrous vanity ever received.. 
I think I have said enough as to the sources from 
which Scott received the money expended on the pur- 
chase of his lands and the improvements of Abbotsford ; 
and I must have satisfied every candid mind, that the 
debts taken upon him in 182S were not his private 
debts, and that the ultimate liabilities were encreased, 
not by his private transactions, but by Ballantyne's 
** frugality," and the renewal of the Company accom- 
modations. These are the points I was particularly 
anxious to make clear. I beg it to be explicitly under- 
stood, that I by no means assert that Sir Walter on no 
occasion made use (with James Ballantyne^s complete 
knowledge of course) of the Company's credit or funds 
for an occasional emergency. One case is referred to 
by the Pamphleteers, when he required, it seems, air 
immediate draft to pay the price of one of his son's com- 
missions in the army ;. and there may, no doubt, !iaye> 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FBUGUSSON. 95 

been others. But Scott never failed, on receiving the 
money for a new novel, to replace such adv&nces.* I 
need hardly repeat, that the mere expense of the re- 
newals, admittedly at the rate of £1200 a-year, exclu- 
sive of stamps and exchanges, and . of course always 
advancing to a larger sum year after year, is in itself 
sufficient to account for the increase of £10,000 be- 
tween 1822 and 1826. But in truth, if Scott had 
drawn in this shape monies out of the concern during 
that period, neither would this, on the one hand, esta- 
blish the charge now brought forward against him; nor, 
on the other, would it be matter of which Ballantyne, 
who had overdrawn his share by at least £8000, could 
possibly complain ? 

Everything being clear, then, as to the state of Sir 
Walter's advances at the date of the contract in 1822, — 
it being proved that he had not received private and 
personal accommodations prior to the institution of the 
new Company — and the fact being also established that 
he had not increased for his own purposes, by renewed 
discounts, the debts of the Company betwixt its insti- 
tution and its termination in 1826 — what more remains 
to be said in answer to the charges in the pamphlet ? — 
Not much — but something ! 

I have now reached the most painful point in the 
whole of this production — the assertion of these Trus- 
tees, that " the catastrophe of 1826 first revealed to Mr 
James Ballantyne the astounding fact, that a year be- 

* The only letter that I have seen m which Sir Walter alludes 
to a Company bill drawn for his personal accommodation, states 
the nature of the literary work by which he would forthwith can- 
cel it ; and the anxious delicacy of his language can leave no doubt 
that in other oasee, if such there were, he followed the same 
course. 



96 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FER6USS0N. 

fore, the foundation upon which he built all his hopes 
of safety nad been destroyed by the deliberate act of 
his friend and partner." Here, thank God, there is no 
need for me to hunt out our friend'^s vindication from 
among the mazes of figures. I believe I can satisfy 
every rational being, that Acre the Trustees have (though 
I by no means say consciously,) asserted a flagrant un- 
truth. 

But, first of all, let me ask any candid man who has 
followed me in my minute deduction of the position in 
which Scott and Ballantyne stood to each other as to 
money matters at every marking stage of their connec- 
tion, — and indeed throughout the whole course of it, — 
whether he is of opinion, that when the marriage of Cap- 
tain Scott and your niece was on the tapis in the begin- 
ning of 1825, Sir Walter was bound to consult James 
Ballantyne about anything he might please to do with 
respect to the settlement of his landed estate? The 
Pamphleteers choose, you see, to suppress all allusion 
to the fact, that the settlement then made reserved to 
Sir Walter the right of borrowing £10,000 on his 
lands, and that this sum was accordingly borrowed, and 
applied to the purposes of Ballantyne & Co. and Con- 
stable & Co. before the end o/'1825 — the loan being 
negociated and the necessary instruments prepared by 
James Ballantyne's brother-in-law, Mr George Hogarth, 
W. S. Besides this £10,000 worth of land at Abbots- 
ford, left free. Sir Walter had other property, both real 
and personal, which the marriage-settlement nowise af- 
fected, to an extent infinitely beyond anything that could 
ever have been claimed from the real and personal estate 
of James Ballantyne — a freehold house, &c. in one of the 
best streets of Edinburgh — books, &c. in the country, 
worth at least £10,000 — the copyrights of several im- 



I.ETTBR TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSON. 97 

{k]^ant works, which works alone realized a very consi- 
derable dividend to the creditors within the first eighteen 
months of the trust — to say nothing of the power of se- 
curing large sums at any time in the shape of life as- 
surance. Was it necessary that Sir Walter Scott, being 
thus situated as to real and personal property, and other 
resources equally available, should feel himself bound 
in honour and honesty to consult his debtor Ballantyne 
as to such arrangements as he did make in the view of 
Ijis son's marriage ? I apprehend no man of common 
s^nse win say that he was bound to do any such thing ; 
and I am very sure no one can have read the Memoirs 
of his Life Without believing, that when that settlement 
was made, he considered himself to be in possession of 
resources independent of those which it affected, far 
mpre than sufficient to meet any demands that existed 
against him as the partner of Mr Ballantyne. But 
whether he consulted Ballantyne on the busfiness or not, 
that Ballantyne must have been perfectly cognizant of 
what Sir Walter then did, at the time when it was 
done, is a fact susceptible of most abundant proof. 

TTiese Trustees appear to forget throughout their 
production, but most especially on this point, the sort of 
position which Sir Walter Scott hdd in the society of 
his native city, and in the public eye of the whole coun- 
try. Edinburgh is the residence of as lively, curious^ 
gossiping a community, as ever existed on the face of this 
globe. Sir Walter was the foremost man within her walls 
— primus absque secundo. In his " own romantic 
town,* there was more curiosity and speculation about 
his movements than about any other individual in the 
whole world. He was the Great Unknown and the 
Great Wellknown ; iand the establishment of his son 
tfnd b^ir was^ — as everybody who had then passed child- 

I 



98 BETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSONf 

bood must well remember, — a matter of more interest 
among the talkers of a town of talk, than any similar 
event in any other family in all Scotland. 

I have not been much in Edinburgh of late, but I 
w^is there twice, each time for a few. days, subsequently 
to the publication of this pamphlet, and I asked every 
acquaintance of Sir Walter ScotCs that I met with, whe- 
ther ^€ did not know all about the settlement of February 
1826 at the time ? Professor Wilson, Sheriff Cay, Peter, 
Robertson, &c. &c. — in short, every one answered that 
he did. The thing occurred when the Session was full ; . 
it was the discourse of every knot in the Outer House— 
and no one I could come at had ever entertained the 
shadow of a suspicion that any attempt to keep an iota 
of the matter secret had ever been dreamt of. Among 
the literary circles, of course, the curiosity was espe- 
cially quick. Mr Cadell bears witness that everything 
vf^ known and discussed openly in Constable's shop — r 
and most certainly the same was the case at Blackwood's^ 
If it was well known in such places, who can swallow 
the assertion that it remained then, and for nine mondis 
afterwards, a secret in the printing-office of James Bal- 
lantyne and Co. ? 

You, of course, were present at the dinner recorded 
in the Life of Scott, vol. vi. p. 2, after which the 
contract was produced and signed ; when Sir Walter, 
laying down the pen, exclaimed, that he had more 
satisfaction in parting with his estate than he had ever 
derived from its acquisition. You well remember the 
feelings with which we all heard those words, -^ and I. 
suppose, when I offer distinct evidence that James Bal- 
lantyne was invited to be present in Sir Walter's house, 
on the evening of the wedding-day, few will doubt that 
he did join the party then, and pledge with hearty zeal 



Xi£TTBR TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSONr 99 

many a bumper-toast, in which perfect knowledge of all 
that had happened the day before wa» implied. 

On the 26th of January 1825, Sir Walter's excellent 
friend, Charles Erskine, his Sheriff-substitute, died at 
Melrose, and Sir Walter was of course invited to his 
funeral, which took place on the 3d of February: but 
he could not attend-^ for the marriage-contract of hi§ 
3pn was to be signed in Castle Street on the evening of 
the 2d of February, and the wedding had been -fixed 
for the 3d. 

To Mr James Ballantyne. 

"Dear James, 

" Our great day is on Thursday 3d. As it is unconstitu* 
tional this season to have [large] parties on an assembly night, 
we propose to have a little evening party on Thursday. I hope 
Sandie and you will attend. I expect we will have some good 
singing. 

'' Poor Charles Erskine's death hath thrown a damp on my 
festivity. I shall never have a more true friend. His last letter 
to me requested to know the day, that he might be at his post, 
and drink at least one bumper^ and ere it comes he will be lying 
in Dryburgh Abbey. 

" Come nevertheless, for regrets avail not ; and I hope Sattdie 
wiir be so kind as t<^ bring the violin as well as the little mirth- 
maker.* ^ 

^^ I get into my wheel again to-morrow for certain, having an- 
swered my century of applications for the Sheriif-substitateship, 
— Yours truly, 

W. Scott/^ 

The few surviving members of Sir Walter''s family 
concur in stating that the terms of the contract were 
familiar at the time to all their circles of acquaintance 
The intimate friends with whom Sir Walter was in 

* Mr Alexander Ballantyne excelled on the flageolet. 



100 LETTER TO SlfL ABA^ FfiROUSSOIT. 

habits of constant correspondence — Lady IxratsaStoartV 
Lord Montagu, Mrs Joanna Bailiie, Miss Edgewortb, 
Mr Morritt, were all informed of his arrangements by 
himself, or by some of his family, at the time. But 
excuse me ; I really feel the gross ridicule of labouring 
this ipoint in a commimication addressed to you. You 
had been like a brother to him from his earliest day J 
but excepting yourself and Lady Fergusson, he certainly 
had had previously no familiarity with any of the nume* 
rous relations of his son's bride. They were all, of course, 
well informed of every particular touching the great 
incident of her life. Her guardians requested, as they 
were bound to do, a settlement such as was made, and 
made with joy and alacrity, by Sir Waher. Did all this 
new circle of connexions abstain from talkkig of the 
circumstances imder which their young lady's allianoe 
with Sir Walter Scott's house was to take place ? 

The contract was drawn up by » and idgned of course 
in the presence of Mr Isaac Bayley, oae of the bride'^s 
nearest relations, and the legal manager of ber afimirs* 
I submit the following extract from a recent letter of 
that gentleman'^s : — 

<« EtUflbi^b, 2lat Dec 1SS8. 
*^ I hope you wUl not think me officious if I allude to that part 
of the Bailaatyne Pamj^let in whiola the present Baroniei*a con- 
tcarct of mariiag<e is mentioned. I prepared that deed, and the 
pretended ignorance upon the part of Mr Ballantyne, of tiie fact 
that that deed settled the fee of Abbotsford upon the present Sir 
Walter, is what I for one cannot credit. Even had the late Sir 
Walter not hiniself infoi^med Mr Ballantyne,' he must, I am sa- 
tisfied, have known it from other quarters. No concealment 
whatever was dreamt of. Lord Corehouse, then at the bar, 
was, I know, consulted by Sir Walter upon the very point of 
the settlement of the estate. Mr John Shank More, Advo- 
cate, revised the deed: the Deputy- Keeper of the Signet had 
it subitiitted to him for a particular pttrpese, isimeifiately upon 



X^BTfltlt TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSObtlai IQl 

its bemgr executed. There are no less than seven trustees named 
in the deed. Sir AdaiQ Fergusson, the present Dean of Faculty 
then Solicitor-General, and the Reverend Dr David Dickson of 
St Cuthbert*s, being three of them ; and I personally know that 
the subject was talked of in the society of £<£nburgh wherdvw 
the parties were known, and you eonld hardly have met an indi* 
▼idual at the tim», o£ Sir Waltw*s aequaintance, unacquainted 
with the fiict. Indeed, I shall venture to say, that the impres- 
sion created by Lady Scott having had a handsome fortune led 
to the conviction, and a natural one it was, that Sir Walter o^ 
his part must have l^ttled Abbotsford in the marriage^contraiot 
on his 8on*s &mi]y. I may add, that immediately a&er the maz^ 
riflge, htfefimeni pasted upon the contract over Abbotsford, and 
ike instrument was recorded, thus making the deed patent to all 
the world. But the one fact of Messrs Constable and Co., who 
at the time were habit and repute in good circumstances, know- 
ing of the settlement of Abbotsford, is eonelusive that no e<m' 
cealraent was attempted ; for they of aU parties, from the hecgt 
accommodation they were affording the printing concern, would 
have been kept in ignorance, had such been an object; but thej^ 
knew all, and who will believe that they, if no other party did, 
would not inform Mr Ballantyne?*' 

Mr John Hughes (p. 49), a person employed, il 
seems, in the printing-house, and one of James BaUan« 
tyne's testamentary trustees, is the sole authority adduc^ 
for the allegation which I have last been discussing, 
Ballantyne's own brother Alexander, and one of his 
brothers-in-law the Hog^rths, are also Trustees — bul 
they say nothing — the statement rests entirely up<»i 
Mr Hughes. I know nothing about this individual — I 
fierer heard of him before ; but I think I may» without 
any egregious trespass upon charity, ccmclude^ that if 
James Ballantyne ever did say anything susceptible ei 
the interpretation adopted by these Pamphleteers, it 
escaped his lips in some moment of flatulent sel£4ndul. 
gence — what Saunders Fairford calls " Uawin' and 
bleezin',** Mr Hughes' note is addressed to Mr Cadelt 



102 LETTER TO SIB ADAM FER€(USSOK« 

in October 1837, twelve years afiter the transaction as 
to which he speaks. He says, it is notorious that the 
whole of the bills were Sir Walter's, and that James did 
not know of the settlement of Abbotsford in the mar- 
riage-contract. The marriage-settlement was indeed no* 
torious, and is it credible that James could be ignorant 
of that publicly recorded settlement of the estate — the 
isubject of universal conversation? If so, I will venture 
to say he was the only one, — lawyer -•- lady — publisher 
— printer — or publican, within the four comers of Auld 
Reekie, who remained uninformed of a matter so engross* 
ing to the feelings of his partner and patron. The thing 
is ridiculous. On the other hand, it has been demon- 
strated that the bills were not Sir Walter's, but original 
Company debts, and renewed as such; so that if to 
this part of the statement the allegation of notoriety is 
to be applied, it is only upon the principle of rumour 
being a conmion liar. 

Since Mr John Hughes has been introduced, it inay 
be as well to say a word here as to another matter in 
which the pamphlet, as far as I understand it, contra-- 
diets me upon his authority. I allude to my statement 
that the disaster of Sir Walter Scott's affairs wa* 
much aggravated in consequence of certain counter- 
bills, held by the Constables, being thrown into the 
market, under circumstances which Sir Walter could 
not have contemplated or provided against. Mr Hughes 
denies that anything of this sort occurred, and the 
<* Refuters'' seem to adopt his denial. They produce 
some letters, which on seeing my proof-sheets in his 
professional capacity, he addressed to my publisher, 
Mr Cadell, in the expectation that Mr Cadell would 
forward them to roe, and that upon their strength I 
would alter what I bad written as to this business. Mr 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSON. 103 

Cadell tells ine> that be considered Hughes^s interference 
About a work advancing througb the press of bis em- 
ployers, as presumptuous, and tbat he should have 
thought it wrong " upon principle,'^ to forward any 
such dispatches to the author whom they criticised. 
He never communicated them to me, but had he done 
so, I certainly should have paid very little attention 
to their tenour, for this reason, which I presume you 
and every other^ sane man will bold satisfactory,— 
namely, that the statement which this subaltern of the 
Ballantynes impugns, was drawn up by me on the 
authority of Mr Cadell himself, the surviving partner 
of the house of Constable, and, as you well know, one 
of the most acute men of business in existence. Mr 
Cadell might perhaps have done well to call my attention 
to the possibility of some blockhead's taking in a literal 
s^nse what I said about the ^^ accumulation of a truly 
monstrous sheaf of bill s,*^— a figure, of course, for 
a monstrous accumulation of obligations, no mattelr 
whether embodied in bill piled upon bill, or bills re* 
pewed and increased in amount. But the only point I 
cared one farthing about was the fact that, according to 
Constable^s partner, Scott could not have anticipated 
being called upon to discharge twice over the monies 
indicated by a certain large amount of bills drawn by 
James Ballantyne & Co. ; and Mr Cadell's letter on the 
subject, addressed to me in October 1836, opened this 
topic in these words : — " One thing Sir Walter never 
could have foreseen^* 

I have in my own hands, however, clear evidence, 
that $it a much earlier stage of the Ballantjme history^ 
a suspicion did arise, that Constable might throw into 
the market acceptances, of which the other party had 
not anticipated the circulation* I find among Sir Wal« 



104 LETTER TO SIR ADAH FBRGUSSON« 

ter's letteis to Johnny Rigdum one dated 12th August 
1819, in which he says, " Your conjecture is wrong 
about Constable's negociations* They have all our ac- 
ceptances in their pocket4>ook. James saw them the 
other day." 

Mr Hughes's real object, however, is to vindieate the 
Ballantynes from the charge of having neglected thek 
business and Scott's, by, inter diaj never giving him 
true, fuU, and accurate statements of the condition i£ 
their joint affairs ; and Mr Hughes is mudi mistaken if 
he su{^oses that he can get over this by telliiig that they 
sent Sir Walter lists of bilku^bills so hugely increased by 
James's extravagance unknown to Seott — lists he pro^ 
bably did little more than glance over -^ when it is now 
clear bey<md all controversy, that no proper, r^^nkr, 
intelligible books were kept in either ccmeem ; and that 
jl^ear after year^ the printing partners* aceousts inter 
^e were never balanced by the manager, whom the deed 
of copartnery exjnessly bound to do so once at least in 
every twelvemonths. And the Trustees are quite as 
much mistaken, if they imagine that they can get ov& 
facts such as these by merely requoting from my own 
book merciful expressions of Sir Walter's with respect 
to his partners, which I inserted for no other purpose 
but that of exhibiting his gracious magnaninnty, pro<^ 
against ahnost unparalleled provocations ; or by quoting 
the opiniims of third parties, who had not, and could 
not have had, the least access to the secret history ef 
James BaUantyne as a partner^ 

Finally as to Mr Hughes. That person (p. 47) 
asserts that Sir Walter was well aware of all the ob- 
ligations on the Company, and that *^ of all these obli- 
gations Sir Walter kept a regular account in a book of 
his own (a royal 8vo. boand in red • moroeeo). This 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 10$ 

matter,'" he adds, ^' was no farther under James Bat- 
lantyne's maDagement than as he was the mere insin^ 
ment in gettiug the bills discounted." In another part 
of the pamphlet (pp. 34, 35), it is stated that Sir 
Walter was made acquainted with the situation of the 
bills by the exhibition of regular monthly states, and 
also that he ^^ kept a private record of these bill engage* 
ments, ivhioh his son-in-law may by possibility have 
seen ;"— and then reference is made to Sir Walter's 
aceurate habits as to his own personal accounts, as. if 
this private record had been aomelhing of the sama 
description* Now, I never asserted that Sir Walter 
was not made acquainted with the btiis, and I was 
far from saying that he did not see, or might not 
have seen, monthly states of these current obliga* 
tions; — what he was kept ignorant of was not the 
granting J but the appiieation of ike proceeds of the bills ^ 
and the manner in which James BalkaUyne was squan^ 
dering these proceeds. But as to a private record, in 
the sense of these Pamphleteers, there was nothing 
of the kind. I have seen the red book, which passed 
to and fro between ^r Walker and the counting- 
house — and which was so little of a private descrip* 
tion, that it was known to the partners' clerks. I 
went over it line by line ; — and I assert that there is 
aot one jotting in Sir Walter's handwriting — not a 
single mark of that from the first page to the last. 
Surely there is gross unfairness in representing ti\\% 
public bill-book, to which all had access, as if it had 
been a private record in Sir Walter's own handwriting, 
and therefore tending to show that the bills had been 
private transaotions of his own, which he entered in 
the same manner for his own private satisfaction as 
he did his personal expenditure. The book-keeper, 



106 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSON. 

Mr James, would have done well, had he in his depart- 
-inent imitated Scott's accuracy in these personal mat* 
ters ; but Mr James could never have represented the 
bill-book, known to this Mr Hughes himself, a clerk 
of the concern at the time, as a private record of 
Scott'e own ; nor could anything be more absurd, than 
-to draw from such an assumption (even had it not 
•been entirely erroneous), the inference that the bills 
were for Scott's private accommodation. Such is 
another specimen of the slender threads upon which 
all these charges are hang. 

. The Pamphleteers seem to lay great stress on a cer- 
tain malagrugrotts exposition of his own views and 
prospects, drawn up by James Ballantyne in February 
1826, when he was eager to have the Company seques- 
trated at once, which, but for Sir Walter's heroic feet 
ing and spirit, it no doubt would have been. One must 
make due allowance for the agitation and excitement of 
the poor man at that moment ; but when the Trustees 
print in itaUcs his statement, that in case the line of a 
sequestration were adopted, he would soon be ^^ disen* 
thralled from the painful bonds of dependence, and, as 
I trust, with a character not injured by any invesHga- 
tion which might take placer and his puling about his 
family having been '* reduced /n}i» affluence to beggary 
by no particular error of my own^'*'' they invite attention 
to most lamentable absurdities. Reduced yh>in afflu-^ 
ende ! They bad only been removed from the side of 
a well of other people'^s money, into which Mr James 
had nimbly dropt his bucket during twenty years when- 
ever it suited his purpose so to do, and undoubtedly all 
his kith and kin had partaken largely in this species of 
affluence. We have seen how liberally the old Anchises 
was nurtured, after this pious Mneas had borne him on 



.LETTBR TO SIR ADAM FBR6USS0N. 107 

his shoulders from the ruins of his Eelsonran Troy. 
James was good to " his own."" One entry of his ex- 
penditure for 1823 is, " To seven sovereigns for my 
.son John, to amuse him while confined,^*— in other 
words, for the young Ascanius to play with when he 
was in bed with the measles ! His rocking-horse and his 
pony were ready for him when he recovered I At the 
break-up, a Mr Hogarth, his brother-in-law, stood in- 
debted for the sum of £1563 : 7s. advanced to him by 
dm kind friend out of the funds of James Ballantjrue 
& Co., and never yet repaid; and for several years 
James's accounts also show that he regularly advanced 
from the same source " £20, Mrs. Hogarth's annuity.'* 
These, and many others whieh could be quoted, were 
all kind things; but they remind one of a certain very 
old definition of liberality — " Hoc demmn liberalitas 
appellatur aliena bona largiri." Had Mr James adopted 
a proper course of conduct in 1816, he had then a fair 
opportunity of laying the foundation of affluence for 
his family; but no human power could have reduced 
them Jrom affluence in 1826, because, from 181-6 to 
1826, he had never been worth one shilling, though 
he lived all the while in luxury, drove Creusa and As^ 
canius* about in that symbol of cockney respectability 
a gig, drawn by "my horse Samson;" and when his 
** nether bulk" was in a disturbed state, relieved the 
inner man by the well-regulated trot of " my horse 
Goliah," — both of which useful animals figure in the 
record. Well might James whine about " no parti- 
cular error of my own," and trtist^ after such a career 
of being trusted, that his character would not be in- 
jured by any investigation that might take place. 

There is, however, at least equal coolness in what en- 
Sues, for he proceeds to say, that on a close calculation he 



106 LSTTEB TO SIR ADAM JBROUSSOK. 

finds that, were the concern sequestrated, and his certi^ 
ficate signed, and himself enabled to recommenoe the 
printing solely on his own account, the profits would yield 
him a clear income of £1800 a*year. In all this calcn^ 
tation, which James says he would willingly ^* subject to 
the most rigorous examination,^ sundry points of con^ 
siderable importance are entirely omitted. First of all, 
our friend seems to liave anticipated the comfortable 
discovery of bis pamphleteering eulogists, that he was 
not James Ballantyne, but James Ballantyne & Com- 
pany ; a fact which it puzzles me to reconcile with the 
existence of such a man as Sir Walter Scott, described 
(to say nothing of fifty other documents) in the letters 
missive of 1821, as having contributed to the estab- 
lishment aiid success of the business all along, at least 
as much as the said James; and which I am also at a 
loss to reconcile with anything I have ever heard about 
the procedure adopted under the laws of the land in 
the case of a sequestrated company. No one can now 
doubt, and indeed these sapient Pamphleteers have 
themselves demonstrated, that a sequestration must 
have prostrated James in the utmost humiliation of 
ruin. AjudicicU trustee, acting under the authority of 
the Court of Session, could have known one partner no 
more than another. It was the Private Trust, adopted 
and followed out in consequence of Scott^s resolution, 
and the feelings with which all the creditors regarded 
Aim, — > it was this, and this alone, that saved James 
Ballantyne. The gigantic efibrts made by Sir Walter 
in 1826, 1827, 1828, and 1829, cost him health and 
life, but they were the salvation of James. The pay- 
ments derived from Sir Walter^s writings were so large, 
that the trustees of the creditors, from the first acting 
in everything with revereutial deference to Aim, were 



UTTKR TO SIR ADAM FBRGUBSOKi 109 

disposed to concede to his expressed widies with respect 
to Baliantyne; Scott undertaking to clear off ultimately 
the whole outstanding debt, iaxaes was then and thus 
enaUed to establish himself as the Canongate printer^ 
** the profits entirely his own ;^ and the said profits^ 
would, afta: all, have been insufficient to enable him 
to wipe off the new debt he contracted to the friends 
who bought office, materials, &c. for him, and ultimately 
to place his family in real affluence, unless Scott had 
e(Mitinued to hold over him the shield of bis patronage, 
sad Jbrced the largest regular supply of pr(^t$ that 
any printer in Europe ever derived from any one private 
source, to flow during the whole period of his own feltal 
struggle, into the coffiers of Baliantyne. 

I had almost forgotten to observe another extraor^ 
dinary piece of assurance on the part of these Pam« 
phleteers. They tell us that the success of the prints 
ing busineffi afi&c January 1826 is of itself sufficient 
proof ^f the utter absurdity of all my all^ationa 
about James Balkntyne's inattention and mismanagie- 
mem in the previous period. Charming logic ! During 
the four years 1826-1889, of which they exhibit 
the prosperous business and well kept accounts, 
the ooBcerii was not in James's hands at all, but first 
in those of the crecMtOTs' trustees, Messrs Jdlie, Mony^ 
penny, imd Gabscm, three long-headed writers to the 
signet, who kept a siharp eye upon every item of ex^ 
penditui^e, allowing James to meddle with nothing but 
the siqpervistOB of the typography, for which they paid 
him hiB salary of £400 ;— and siiterwards of the excel- 
lent Mr Cowan, who a^>eaT8 to have advanced the money 
for the purdiase of the printing-house, types, &c* from 
the trustees. James was then confined to. the ^^ parts ol 
ikk businesa whidn he really liked," and bad, notiiiog to 



110 LITTER TO SIR ADAM FERaUSSOV.- 

do with ^^ the most important points," of which, in 
June 1821, he has confessed his gross neglect, and as. 
to which he persisted in his negligence so long as he 
was Scott's partner. I find him writing to Scott on the 
28th December 1826, ^^ My judgment in commercial 
matters, is meagre enough," — and so it was. But by 
that time the management was no longer the same, 
though the protection and patronage were. And if, after 
he had the management again, the concern continued 
to be conducted in a style very different from what its 
history down to 1826 has exhibited, is it not plain that 
this was the consequence of the man's having then at last 
arrived at the years of discretion ? He did take warning 
from the calamity which, but for his guardian angelf 
must have crushed him to the dust. He did look to his 
situation as it had been, as it was, and as it might come 
to be. He adhered to the system of management which 
he had seen substituted for his own. In &ct, he was by 
that time a changed man in almost every respect — inter 
alia^ he had substituted prayer-meetings for the gossip 
of the green-room ; and if I understand aright a very 
eurious part of his correspondence with Scott, he had 
become <me of the worshipfrd society of tea^totallers ! 

I am very unwilling to plague you with another 
deduction of figures, and perhaps it is idle to ex-, 
pose further the gross inaccuracies with which this 
pamphlet abounds. Why the minute State of accept^ 
ances passing between James Ballantyne and Co. and 
Constable and Co. in the year 1822 is introduced, ex- 
cepting for the purpose of mystification, I cannot 
conjecture. Nor, as I have already hinted, can I see 
the bearing of that part of their main State, on pages 
60 and 61, in which the large ultimate balances are 
introduced, exceeding £80,000, all of which— and the 



LETTEK TO SIR ADAM TERGUSSON^ 111 

Slim includes the not inconsiderable private debts of 
James Ballantyne ! — Sir Walter had to pay in the end; 
But I must say a few words more about one astound* 
ing piece of audacity exhibited at p. 58. It is there 
gravely asserted, that, ** for behoof qf Sir Walter ScM^s 
creditors, Mr James Ballantyne contributed upwards of 
£8000^ independently of his share of business profits, 
from Whitsunday 1822 till January 1826, and his pro* 
portion of the profits on the novels, ndmis the aniount 
of his family expenses for the same period, which last 
scarcely exceeded the half qf his income.*^ 

In order to make up this sum of £8000, we are re- 
ferred to States on the two immediately preceding 
pages, showing that there was a balance of the pro- 
ceeds of the printing concern of £6563 : : 1 J ; and 
in order to make this amount to upwards of £8000, 
there is added £1400 as Mr Ballantyne's interest ia 
the Weekly Journal, and £800 as the price of a 
bouse he was having built in Anne Street* Now^ 
supposing that Ballantyne's share of the Weekly 
Journal afforded the sum stated, which I beg leave 
to doubt, and letting the bouse pass at £800 (al- 
though, in point of fact, I understand the net sum 
realised from it, after repaying the outlay of the 
Trustees, was exactly £125 sterling), of what do yon 
think this £6563 composed ? It is of the proceeds of 
Mr Ballantyne's house in Heriot Row — £l TOO — of 
£185, 10s. drawn by the sale of certain policies on his 
life ; and all the rest is the assets in the printing-office, 
the materials, printing accounts, profits from carrying 
on the business after the bankruptcy, &e. &c.-— all re- 
covered by the Trustees betwixt 1826 and 1830* Upon 
what possible pretence is the whole of the proceeds of 
James Ballantyne and Co* to be set down in any ar^ 



112 LBTTKR TO SIR ADAM FEROUSSOK. 

rangement, exclusively to the credit of Ballantyne, 
when Scott was a partner to tbe extent of one half? 
And as to profits to the credit of the frugal James, I 
tliink I have pretty well settled that point, by showing 
that Mr James spent no less than £933 1, daring the 
three and a half short years of the last copartnery. 

It would be an unnecessary waste of your time, 
after what I hare just stated, to make a computation 
of what Mr James had in 1826: he will be a bold 
defender of the '^ fmgar' printer, who will assert that 
he was not, as an individual, many thousands under 
water at the smash ; and it must be obrious^ that the 
longer be ran at his railway pace of expenditure, the 
worse he must have become. 

But there is still another twig by which these sinking 
^^ Refttters" may wish to catch. Sir Walter, with a 
generosity almost unequalled, writes in January 1826 
(Pamphlet^ pp. 42 and 43) that James's difficulties, 
m well as his advantages, were owing to him ; and he 
finally consents to his discharge in a letter expressing 
his satisfaction, that in all their transactions James had 
<< acted with the atmost candour and integrity." The 
conelnsion to be drawn from this wifl go but a short 
way to ^tcuse our Pamphleteers. Observe that Sir 
Walter never attacked the integrity of James Ballan- 
tyne. Neither did I. On the contrary, I expressly 
said (Life, vol. vi. p. 110), that *^ I had no intention 
to cast the slightest imputation on the moral rectitude 
of the elder Ballantyne. No suspicion of that nature 
ever crossed my mind» I believe James to have been 
from fir«t to last a perfectly upright man — that his prin^ 
dples were of a lofty stamp — his feelings pure, even to 
ttmpUci^." Here the matter stood ; and here it would 
have been iortiinate had these friends of the deceased 



Z>£TTS& TO SIR APAM FBRQUS80K. 113 

allowed h to stand. The wbole import of my states 
ment was, that, as a man of affairs, and as manager of 
the business, Ballantyne bad injured Scott by bis care- 
lessness and inefiieieney. It is tbe Pampltleteers who 
make the charge, and not I. It is they who impngti 
Sir Walter's reputation, and charge him with sacri^ 
ficing the Ballantynes by using the funds of the con* 
cerns for his own private purposes. And if, in investi- 
gating tbe matter now, errors upon the part of James 
Ballantyne have come to light which were concealed 
from Seott at the time — if it now appears, for example, 
that James had spent £9aoa between 1822 and 1826, 
instead of restrieting himself to £1750 — and if from 
this or any other fact disclosed^ a harsher conclusion 
is now to be drawn — if it is to be held that in many 
things Scott was blinded, if not deceived — what availa 
it to the accusers of Scott to ref^ to the generous effu^ 
stotts of his unsuspecting nature ? The question now 
i% not whether Scott in ignorance drew too favourabU 
a picture of the partner whom he had so greatly bene-* 
fited. It is, on the contrary, whether these Pamphle- 
teers have been justified in the charges they have 
brought forward against Scott I doubt extremely 
whether Sir Walter, if now alive, would have given 
ihem a white- washing certificate. If John Ballantyne's 
precious States and business-like valuations had been 
explained to and understood by him — if he had been 
old that the concern was bankrupt at a time when it 
was represented to him to have been realising 50 per 
cent, profit — if he had seen that James was violating 
the contract by drawing at the rate of £2500 a- year, 
instead of limiting himself to the more suitable pro- 
vision of £500 — and if, in order to establish, a^ 
agakkst him (Scott), the false accusation^ that> for his 

K 



114 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FBRGUdSOK'. 

own peeoniaiy advantage, he bad rained thefie Ballan- 
tjnes, the unadjusted States had been perverted, sums 
had been carried to the wrong column, and upon this 
perversion new accounts had been reared up, as indefen- 
sible in principle as inaccurate in detail — whatever his 
charity might have led him still to hope, I hardly think 
that he could have complimented our Pamphleteers as 
having acted with the utmost candour. It is impossible 
to contemplate Scott's generosity to these Ballantynes, 
without wondering at the bewildered malignity with 
which the production before me has been elaborated 
— and without blushing for James in particular. We 
have Scott giving him the means to pay a debt of 
£3000 in 1816, and above £4000 from the same source 
to expunge debt of 1822 — we have James squander* 
ing £7000 of Sir Walter's from 1822 to 1826— here 
we have, without computing interest, about one third 
of the £46,000 of bills in 1826 accounted for ! and if 
certain entries in James's cash-jottings tell any thing, 
I suspect no very difficult investigation would bring 
out, that private debts^ of tvhich he paid the interest^ 
and billSf which he appears to have negociated for 
his own purposes^ came all eventually to be paid by 
Sir Walter, and formed a part of the above sum of 
£46,000.» 

* I believe there can be no question that nearly X2000 was 
qmetly rested upon Sir Walter by this very simple procedure. 
There is, therefore, no great difficulty in comprehending that 
James's personal debt, apart from that represented by Company 
obligations, appeared small at the time of the catastrophe. It is, 
however, rather puzzling to understand how the Pamphleteers, 
with the Company books, and James's own *' Cash-jottings" before 
them, could venture to say that at that epoch his personal debts 
did not exceed £100! To be sure, he was careful enough €o 
give his wife £250 on the very morning of the smash ! -But I 
abstain— ^-^. 



• LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 1 15 

Sir Walter's kindness, however, for James Ballan- 
tyne did not expire with the catastrophe of 1826. I 
gave, in the Memoirs of his Life, several proofe of the 
•kind zeal with which he continued to the last to watch 
over Ballantyne's interests. The truth is, that James's 
family at this moment owe everything they have in the 
world to that zeal. It was Scott's Magnum Opus — the 
uniform edition of the Waverley Novels, &c. &c., which 
began in 1829, and continued for more than seven 
years — it was this piece of work that made them in- 
dependent. 

James Ballantjme wrote as follows on the 22d April 
1829: — 

*' Dear Sir Walter, I confess I did hope that we should be 
en^tlo7ed to piint the whole of the Mag;num^ but Mr Cadell is now 
taking in estimates from other printers, and I see much reason 
to believe that a great part of it will be removed from me. This 
is taking a great liberty, Sir, but it is one which you will excuse, 
considering the long period of our intercourse, and that I had 
hoped this favourite work would have helped to render tolerable 
the evening of my life." 

Again, on the 4th September 1829, he says — 

" Dear Sir Walter, several months since I informed you of 
my belief that I had nothing to depend upon from Mr Cadell, as 
manager of the Magnum^ in the way of being employed in that 
■work any longer or farther than he felt compelled to employ me. 
I said that I wished nothing to be done in the way of interference 
then, but that when the time came, as I knew it would come, 
that my apprehensions w^e realized, I should then solicit your 
aid and support. Your answer was to assure me of your support 
when that time came. Upon my success in my appeal will de- 
pend whether the remainder of my life will be passed in some 
decent show of independence, or in a state of suffering as great 
as can be inflicted." 

These prayers were not uttered in vain! the arm of 
strength and mercy was extended! 



1 16 LETTER TO SIR ADAM WUKQVSSQW. 

I think there is only one part more of the Pam- 
pbleteers^ long story that I need say anything about. 
They seem to believe that they overturn all my state- 
ments about Scott and Ballantyne's pecuniary doings, 
by hauling up the ^* inductive clause^ of a mutual 
bond of discharge entered into by these Ballantyne 
Trustees and Sir Walter'^s representatives soon after 
the death of Ballantyne.* This deed contains a formal 
renunciation of all claims against Ballantyne^s estate 
on the part of Sir Walter's executors ; and, say these 
gentlemen, " it is certainly very satisfactory to find 
the accuser himself a party to such a deed, embody- 
ing, as it does, a formal contradiction of all he has 
since promulgated to the disparagement of Mr BaIIan« 
tyne." I need hardly repeat, that at the time when this 
deed was executed I knew nothing of the details of 
Scott^s and Ballantyne^s commercial comiexion ; and I 
shall show presently that at that time none of the legal 
agents employed on either side possessed any informa- 
tion whatever as to the real state of their pecuniary 
position towards each other. The Pamphleteers, how- 
ever, assume, that if Sir Walter'jH executors had had the 
least notion that any claim could be set up on their 
part against Ballantyne^s estate, they would have been 
the last people in the world to waive such a claim ; 
whereas the truth is, that the very last thing we should 
have thought of at that moment, when we were en- 
gaging for the final payntent of the remaining debts of 
James Ballantyne and Company, would certainly have 
been to act otherwise than in accordance with Sir Wal- 
ter's well-known resolution, in the cause of which he 
had just died, to discharge those debts by his own 

* Sir Walter died in October 1882 — Ballantyne in January 
1833. 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FER6USSON* 117 

efforts and means. In £Eict, Sir Walter's executors 
knew just as much as the child unborn about the long 
history which has now at last been evolved ; but had 
they known all that they know now, they would have 
acted precisely as they did in August 1883. 

' As for myself, I really may say, that thou^ my 
name was signed to the deed, I was never consulted at 
all about the terms of it. I have all along considered 
myself as Sir Walter's literary executor, and abstained, 
in general, from giving either advice or opinion as to 
any steps proposed or adopted in reference to any 
money matters of one sort or another. But I think 
you will agree with me, that when these Trustees 
thought of producing this deed at all, they ought to 
have told, and not suppressed the fact, that it was 
they themselves., the friends of Ballantyne, who prayed 
for this mutual discharge. This is proved by the 
letters which passed between their agent Mr Alex- 
ander Douglas, W. S., and the agent of Sir Walter's 
Trustees, Mr John Gibson junior, W. S^ in July and 
August 18S3» But it will be sufficient far me to quote 
here part of a letter recently addressed to myself by 
Mr Isaac Bayley, who, as agent for Sir Walter's exe- 
cutors, drew up the deed, and having occasion to be 
here in London shortly afterwards, submitted it to me 
for my signature. Mr Bayley says : — 

" As you have already copies of Mr Douglas* letters, which 
prove that it was James Ballantyne's trustees who solicited the 
mutual discharge, which they attempt in their pamphlet to mag- 
nify into so much importance, I need say no more on thai point,, 
except that, whatever inference the public were expected to draw 
from the insinuation that it was you and Sir Walter Scott^s other 
trustees who had been so anxious for this discharge, must now 
recoil on the heads of Mr Ballantyne*s friends. 

'^ But it b due to you that I should give some explanation as 



118 LETTER TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSOK^ 

to the terms of the discharge, and exonerate you from being 
morally responsible for its terms in any way whatever. When J 
bad the honour of being consulted by you and the other members 
of Sir Walter Scott's family at Abbotsford, at the time of his 
death, when you had under consideration making the proposal to 
the creditors for payment of Sir Walter Scott's debts, I then 
brought the point under your consideration, how Mr James Bal- 
lantyne was to be affected by such arrangement? And upon that 
occasion, the strongly expressed wishes of yourself and the other 
members of the family, that the discharge from the creditors 
should include Mr Ballantyne, and that every thing should be 
carried through in the kindest manner towards him — and when 
you then repudiated any idea of asking him to assist in the pay- 
ment of the remaining debts, or of entering into any consideration 
whether he was debtor to Sir Walter Scott or not, I considered 
the feeling then so strongly expressed as warranting me, in any 
communication which I might have with Mr Ballantyne or his 
family, to act for you in the most liberal manner towards him and 
them. When, therefore, I was applied to, to recommend the 
granting of the mutual discharge, I had no hesitation in at once 
giving an assurance that this would be acceded to, although in the 
first instance I felt myself bound in point of form to consult you 
and Sir Walter's other trustees. Having done so, I then prepared 
the discharge. But I may remark in passing, that entirely igno- 
rant as I was of the relative position of Sir Walter Scott and Mr 
Ballantyne to each other as regarded accounts, I applied to Mr 
Gibson, the acting trustee for the creditors of the Company, to 
know whether any account had ever been made up as between them^ 
or whether he could inform me how they relatively stood ; and I am 
free to say, that if I had found that a debt had been ascertained as 
due by Sir Walter Scott to Mr Ballantyne, I should not have hesi- 
tated in bringing that fact before you, and recommending that it 
should be provided for : but Mr Gibson informed me, that no such 
account as I refer to had been made up ; that he had suggested 
the attempting of it when the affairs came into his hands, but that 
both Sir Walter and Mr Ballantyne had dissuaded any such at- 
tempt ; and he has told me since, Sir Walter made use of the 
words that such an attempt * would only be throwing good money 
after bad.' He also informed me, what I have since been satisfied 
was correct, that the books afforded no materials for making up 
such an accoimt. I therefore prepared the discharge ; and when 



LETTER TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 119 

I inserted the clause, that both sets of trustees were satisfied that 
each of their constituents had contributed to the payment of the 
debts in a fair proportion, and that they were satisfied that neither 
had any claim of relief the one against the other, I was certainly 
influenced more by the desire to do the handsome thing to Mr 
Ballantyne's family, than by any precise information how matters 
stood. Perhaps I ought to have inserted, what was really the 
fact, that neither party knew how the accounts stood; but I must 
say, I think Mr Ballantyne's trustees were the last parties, know- 
ing as they did the handsome manner with which their desire for 
a discharge had been met, to rear up the terms of this discharge 
against you. 

^^ But the inductive clause for granting the deed was, in one 
49ense, of little importance; and when you had agreed to grant 
the deed, it would have been most ungracious, even had your 
feelings not been known to me, had I proposed an inductive 
clause which would have stamped ignorance upon all parties con- 
cerned. But whatever the terms of the deed are, I alone am re- 
poBsible for them, and on my responsibility alone was the deed 
signed by you and your co-trustees. I was present when you put 
your name to it, and I am satisfied you never read a word of it." 

Mr Bayley adds, after discussing a different matter, 
this paragraph, upon which I need offer no comment : — » 

, ^' The Pan^phleteers withhold one important fact from the pub* 
lie — the advantage reaped by James Ballantyne from the settle- 
ment you and your co-trustees effected with his creditors. Had 
you not done this, is it not plain that Mr Ballantyne at his death 
must have been an undischarged bankrupt, and must have left 
his family beggars, in place of in the comfortable circumstances 
which he was enabled to do? But gratitude forms no part of the 
ci'eed of the authors of the Pamphlet." 

Upon the whole, the opinion I had expressed about 
these Ballantynes is not improved by the new scrutiny 
which their dear friends have forced upon me. Birds of evil 
omen they both were to Sir Walter — the only doubt is 
which the worst — the Raven or the Magpie- Undoubt- 
edly, the graver brother comes out a shade or two worse 
than he stood before. I am sorry for it. With all his 



( 



pnmp 



120 LBTTEB TO SIR ADAM FBRGUSSOK. 

faults^ I am still disposed to think eharitaUy of James; 
He requires tender dealing when we look closely at some 
things ; but we must remember the ancient saying, that 
it is very difficult for an empty sack to stand erect. The 
faults of idleness and nusmanagement as a commercial 
man, formerly alleged, had also, I thought, been for- 
merly proved: at all events, they have now been so: and 
I adhere to every representation I gave of minor follies 
and absurdities, with increased wonder that one of the 
simplest, as well as greatest of our race, should have 
contiBued, during so many years, to tolerate the hideous 
blunders and negligencies of a person whose style of 
manners presented such a contrast to his own. As for 
*' Jocund Johnny" — " liein* Johnny" ^ he is pretty 
nearly in statu quo, — except that they now have him 
produced in his original capacity, and that I have got a 
key to a query whi€h Scott appended to several of his 
letters, namely, ** Since it takes nine t£ulors to make a 
man, how many ought it to take to ruin one ?* They 
abuse me for producing only a bit of doggerel for proof 
that Scott used to call him his little Picaroon. I respect^ 
fully refer them to a letter in prose to Mr Daniel Terry^ 
dated 2d July 1813, and printed in the life of Sir Walter^ 
vol. iii. p. 64, where the same epithet is a{^lied to the 
^ark; and I dare say, if they supplicate our fair friend 
of Tulse Hill, she will supply them with as many mcMre 
instances as their appetite requires. 

The vindicators of these heroes are in number, it 
appears, six. I acquit one of all blame, and some 
others of much. Different rafembers of the junto have 
obviously furnished different parts of the *< ueanswer- 
able refutation,^ •* the overwhelming exposure,^ *• the 
triumphant appeal,^ {vide Morning Chronicle, Literary 
Gazette, &c^ &c); but some one put the bits together,. 



LBTTEll TO SIR ADAM FERGUSSON. 121 

and the selection of him for such a job was not happy. 
The band that is to dovetail mosaic should be nimble ; 
but it should also be clean* Wherever a grain of dirt 
has crept in^ tliere will, after a little experience of 
northern weather^ be a patent flaw. 

Dear Sir Adam, the pamphlet winds up with a Idog- 
ish extract from the Quarterly Review^ and the classical 
ejaculation «-* 

^^ Qxtsoi iemere in nosmet legem saaetmus viiqtuan /" 

The article they quote is one on the life of Mackin- 
tosh, the writer of which was of opinion that Sir James's 
biographer had giyen him rather more importance in 
the array of our modem Whigs, philosophers, legisla- 
tors, and orators, than was quite his due ; — whereupon 
this writer, watching^ carefully, as a Quarterly Reviewer 
ought to do, over the fair name of Whigs in general, 
complains and rem<H(istrates ; but adds, with commend- 
able candour, that su(^ misrepresentations are rarely 
avoided in ajay contemporary biography — a species of 
compofiidou whereof he says, " the very best specimen" 
may turn out to be ^* a picture, of which the principal 
figure has been considerably flattered, and evseything 
else" (for they put this in c^qjitaJs) " sacrificed to its 
PROMXNEKC^ AND KEFBCT," The hexameter is a hack- 
neyed one-^but they do not understand it. — As Swift 
says — 

^^ I laugh to hear an idiot quote 
A line from Horace learned by rote." — 

They attack the temerity indeed of the supposed law 
breaker, but their argument assumes the equity, in place 
of the iniquity^ of the law alleged to be biq]f^n. But 
this is a trifle; their drift is as evident as their blun- 
der. You must fancy, I presume, that the implied charge 



^^■} 



122 LETTER TO SIE ADAM FERGUSSON* 

against the biographer of Scott is, that he broke a law of 
his own making or sanctioning, by giving that novelist and 
poet undue prominence and effect, to the disparagement 
of Eldgeworth, Austin, Gait, and Hook, — of Wordsworth^ 
Southey, Crabbe, Campbell, Baillie, Moore, or Byron ! 
Not so — the accusation refers to the cases of Aldibo- 
rontiphoscophomio, editor of the Edinburgh Weekly 
Journal, who corrected the proof-sheets of the Waverley 
novels, and published a pamphlet, entitled " Critic, 
dsms upon Mrs Siddons,"- — and of his brother, Rig- 
dumfimnidos, who bequeathed to the world a novel, 
in three volumes, called " The Widow's Lodgings,"— 
but displayed his inventive genius more largely and suc- 
cessfully in the composition of States and Calendars* 
I gave the author of Marmion and Old Mortality too 
much prominence and effect, to the grievous injury of 
these illustrious " contemporaries." 

• v- rvos Poetas et poetrias Picas 
^y-ifltare credas Pegaseium melos!" 

Mtiy l beg of you to present my best compliments to 
your brother the Colonel, .and request him, in my name, 
the next time he makes a sketch of the Castle-rock, td 
be sure that he gives " due prominence and effect" to 
the two barrels of heavy-wet and twopenny, that he 
will see banning away on a truck-cart at the end of the 
Mound ; for if he does not, he will " considerably flatter'* 
that eternal mass of granite, crowned with royal towers^ 
and hallowed with the reverence of ages. — Yours truly, 

,./ J. G. LOCKHART. 



StEVEFSON & CO. FRINTERSt